Time Tots
by gingerbritishgypsyelf
Summary: A fic following the relationship of the Doctor and River Song, during that short time when their time lines matched up. Rated T for possibly adult situations in later chapters. SLIGHTLY AU as of 'A Good Man Goes to War,' but not too much.
1. Prologue

Time Tots

**Prologue**

In fleeing from gunfire, they had run into the Tardis, not managing to shut the door all the way in their rush. The shields took care of the gunfire, so they didn't notice in the flurry of activity as the Doctor piloted the Tardis into the time stream as fast as he could. As River caught her breath, leaning on the closed door, they hit a bump. Afterwards, the Doctor could not say what that bump was, but it jarred the door open enough for one archaeology student, her Master's degree not quite obtained, to tumble out into the time stream.

It all happened so fast that he only had time to scream her name at the top of his voice, dashing to the door, reaching out as she tumbled outside the Tardis's safely shielded little pocket of air. With only moments, he moved faster than he had ever moved before and likely ever would again, rushing to spin the wheel, pilot it back to her. As she fell back into the Tardis's bubble, he pulled her into his time machine, running his hands over her body, checking that she wasn't missing anything.

She was shaking and her expression conveyed a mixture of terror and overload of information. His hands slowed as he verified that she was in one piece and had not grown any extra limbs. He led her to the chair, sat her down, and had the Tardis scan her. It only took moments in the time stream to dissolve into time forever; it was a miracle that she even came out, let alone undamaged.

"River?"

She was young; these were early days for them. She still questioned him with genuine curiosity, not with scorn. She still had a radiant innocence about her. Her eyes were enormous and they swallowed her face then, wide from fear and confusion. She bent herself in two, and threw up all over the floor. Immediately afterwards, she dissolved into hysterical tears.

It took hours for her to stop shaking, and hours longer for her to sleep in her room in the Tardis; she was not a full-time companion and had never been for him. Perhaps one day, if future-River's hints weren't all teasing, she would be.

"I want to go home."

It was the first coherent thing she said, and it had taken her two days to say it. He obliged, leaving her in her dorm room. She hadn't lost all the fear in her eyes yet, but she had allowed a hundred and more tests to be run, and after being assured and reassured that she would be fine, she spoke her singular sentence and left him. The next time they met was over a year later, and she waited for him with a laser pistol and a list of questions. They did not speak of the day she had fallen. They merely picked up where they had left off. These days, these middle days, were when things were linear. The next many years of their meetings would be mostly linear, and she even travelled with him for short spans of time. But she was River Song and he was the last of the Time Lords. Nothing with them was ever simple or easily explained.


	2. Sometime's He's Wrong

Sometime's He's Wrong

He was oddly traditional, for a man who had been everywhere and everywhen there was to be. He went through a period of courting her, careful to do it in the right order, and they had been together for centuries or a few years, depending on how you added up the times they'd been to, when he asked her to stay in the Tardis with him. Only it wasn't an offer as it was to other companions. It was a soft request, shouted in the heat of battle when they were both almost certainly going to die. He had a ring. She said,

"In a moment, sweetie," and stood, shooting down their well-armed and very homicidal pursuers, before dropping back to her knees behind the crate with him and kissing her acceptance so deeply that he could still taste her for hours afterwards.

She wore the ring; it was a star-gem and the closest thing he could get to the Gallifreyan stones that traditionally set his people's jewelry. They planned the wedding the day of; the beauty of time travel was that they could get it all together and then show up, having every appearance of forethought. The Doctor insisted that they didn't need any gifts. River registered them at a little-known knick-knack shop, and a weapons supply depot. Needless to say, both of them received more-than-pleasing wedding presents. His vows were taken in High Gallifreyan, with the traditional words of his people. Much to his delight and astonishment, so were hers.

Everyone was invited. Friends, her family, strangers, and even a tin dog attended the ceremony and reception. He wore a tuxedo and a fez for a few moments, before she disintegrated it. Only River Song would carry a gun to her wedding. She wore a white dress, startlingly traditional, and unbeknownst to everyone but her, hand-made by a friend who had declined to attend the wedding. They ate cake and danced and his gift to her was the attendance of her favorite character of history. Hers to him was a pair of handcuffs and a mischievous smile.

After the party had ended and everyone had been carried home in his little blue box, they were alone. It was then and only then that smiling, he took her by the hand and led her into the back of the Tardis, a part she had never been in before. The door was plain, dull and unpolished wood, unremarkable except for a slight metallic sheen to it. The other side of it was anything but unremarkable.

The Doctor's bedroom was a magnificent place; for of all the traits he displayed, magnificent was certainly one of the most prevalent. His bed alone was enormous, with sheets softer than silk and blankets of a hundred colors. The rugs on the floor softly enveloped her feet; they were so thick and deep that she swore she would just sink into one and vanish. A Victorian-style couch took up one corner, and several doors took up another wall. He pointed each one out to her.

"Wardrobe. Bathroom. Library. They're all one-way. And they only work going from here to there, not the other way around."

She opened her mouth to ask how, but he placed a finger over her lips, amused.

"I promise to explain later."

She nodded slowly and looked up at him, no longer overwhelmed by the room. There was only him and he was all that mattered. Because of all the complications of their lives, of all the strangeness of time and space and them, this one thing that they had was simple. Marriage. He was now and forever _hers_.

Slowly, carefully, she untied the black bowtie, letting her hands linger on the cloth, rubbing it between her fingers. She slid the jacket from his shoulders, never breaking eye contact. She undid each button with agonizing slowness.

One.

By.

One.

His shirt came off. It was not a new sight to her, but this time she did not have to pretend not to look or to shield her appreciation with jokes and mockery. He was hers now, to look at and love any way she pleased. He watched this ritual, her undressing him, with fascination, smiling as warmth hummed in his belly and slowly slipped lower. As she began to unfasten his trousers, she looked up at him, momentarily distracted from her task. Of all the times that they had almost gotten to this point, she had never once asked…

"Doctor, I never asked. Do you…I mean…can we…?"

He laughed and kissed her, sliding his hands along her sides before he whispered tantalizingly into her ear,

"I've got everything you need, River."

His warm breath on her ear. The new, husky tone to his voice. The sheer fact that he was here with her, no more limits or unspoken rules between them. She wanted him. By the ruins of Chelrii Seven, she wanted him.

His trousers were removed faster, followed by what else was left.

He took his turn, removing her layers of veil and dress and slips and underclothes. Smiling and eager, she helped him, seeing as he couldn't seem to manage the tie at the back of her dress, or the hooks of her underclothes. They stood before each other completely uncovered, just drinking each other in. She reached up to brush his face with her fingertips, and he was gone, giving up at the slowness as he covered her hot mouth with his.

It did not take long for things to begin to take their natural course. They moved towards his bed, piled high with blankets and pillows and everything soft and comfortable to sleep with. As they took turns being dominant, it was she who landed on the bed first, the softness giving way under her weight. She lay on her back and as he made his way onto the bed, she put a hand on his warm, bare chest. It took every ounce of self control in her body not to stop him from coming closer, just for that moment.

"Wait," she began, breathless, "Do we need…do you need…can we…"

"Humans and Time Lords can't reproduce."

"Oh."

Whether or not this was a disappointment to either of them was unclear, as the question was immediately banished from their minds, its place taken by something much _much_ nicer.

It was only hours later when they lay snuggled together on his bed, that she pressed her lips to his shoulder blade and asked,

"So how are the doors only one way?"

He laughed and answered by kissing her. When his mouth had removed the idea from her mind, he told her a secret. Something he had never told anyone before and never would again. Something that she would one day sadly whisper back into his ear, knowing that for him, this glorious night had not yet occurred. And once he had told her, she held him forever…or at least until they chose to leave his—their—room.

They adventured and ran and _were_. They were River Song and the Doctor and they travelled and did all the things that people in love did. They visited faraway places and went to old familiar ones. They made memories and took pictures and—in River's case—did an awful lot of unnecessary shooting. They made love, and not just physically. They told each other stories and secrets and fears. They flirted as though they were courting. They tempted and teased and gave in to temptation. _They_ were a _they_, and it was delightful.

**6 months later**

She was out of breath as they stumbled into the Tardis, laughing with fear and triumph, having saved the world—a world—again. His hair was caked in dirt and a little blood. Her leg had a nasty plasma burn on it. Thinking practically, River let the Tardis look after the Doctor first, and instead chose to use the medical scanner in the little room where the Doctor could actually play doctor, what with all the medical supplies it contained. She ran all the usual tests as she bandaged her own leg. When had plasma burns fazed her? Very few injuries fazed her; to her own body anyway. His was a whole different story.

The scanner blipped a positive identification and she turned to see which injections she would be required to give herself.

The positive identification would not require an injection. It was a newly acquired condition, only a few weeks. It would, however, require a whole lot of planning to explain, seeing as she hadn't once strayed, and he _said_….well it appeared that sometimes he was wrong.


	3. Only With Us

Only With Us

She re-ran the scanner once, twice, three times.

Positive.

Positive.

Positive.

How could that be? He had _said_ that…but she knew he had been wrong before. Just never about something this huge. Never about something this close to her. It was both invigorating and frightening that he was wrong; he got too smug for his own good sometimes and his head had to be deflated to avoid squashing others with his ego. Her only problem was that she had no idea how to tell him just how wrong he had been. One had to go about these things delicately. She was not accustomed to treating people delicately.

Carefully clearing the records, she walked back to the console room slower than she had left it. He was still sitting there, being scanned.

"Brain damage then?"

"Not a bit."

"No one would have noticed either way, so I suppose it's a win on all sides." She smiled a triumphant little teasing grin.

"Shut up," he flirted.

"Make me," she replied.

Had he not been in the middle of a scan, they would be full-out snogging by this point. They were, after all, still newlyweds. River briefly wondered if Amy and Rory, now at home and taking a break from the Tardis, had been like this in their early days. She met them a few times, but never linearly in their timelines. It was all written in her journal, anyhow.

Once the scams were finished, she took him to the medical room, having every intention of patching up his head. However, they were both filthy and covered in mud. Bandaging his head would do no good unless he was clean…which led them to the shower in his bathroom…which inevitably led them back into his room to get dressed…which inevitably led them right to his bed. A future version of her would share some hints about what she liked when they were intimate with a past version of him, but she did not know that yet, and he hadn't found any reason to tell her. Besides, he liked being the knowledgeable one for a change, with the ability to smile and say 'spoilers' in that superior tone. Paradoxically, it was him using the phrase 'spoilers' which would cause her to use it, which would cause a past version of him to use it and on and on in a circle. He generally didn't think too much about it. Especially as he and River still never grew tired of spending hours in his room alone, 'doing married people things' as Amy had once delicately put it.

Once they had finished, she put her hand up to run it through his hair and it came away bloody; she swore and sat up, pulling his head closer so she could get a good look at it. The cut was nasty-looking and was beginning to ooze blood again. He raised his head for a kiss, which she gave, but she did not allow him to pull her back down onto his bed.

"We need to tend to this, sweetie."

Groaning, he sat up, looking forlorn.

"It's not as though the bed is going anywhere, love."

"True."

"So the sooner we get you all fixed up, the sooner you can come back."

He nodded in agreement and followed her to the medical room, he in boxers and she in one of his shirts. Once there, she put ointment and a bandage on his cut before playfully kissing it better. He told her seriously that the kiss had fixed the wound, and reminded her that he had cut his lip. Surely it too needed to be attended to? Laughing, she made him chase her back to his room before she would kiss him again. After all, it wouldn't do for her to spoil him.

Later, she propped herself up on her elbow and murmured,

"I'm hungry."

"I see."

"What's there to eat?"

"Well we could go out or stay in."

"Take me somewhere wonderful, Doctor."

He leaned in to kiss her, neck and she closed her eyes, momentarily sinking into the relaxation his touch brought. After a moment though, she dipped her head, gently dislodging his mouth from her throat.

"I'm hungry," she repeated, an amused tone in her voice.

"Five more minutes?"

"When we finish eating, we can play with your wedding gift…"

He pondered this for a moment before kissing her again, and sitting up.

"You drive a hard bargain, River Song."

"Mmmm," she replied, pleased but noncommittal.

"Where are we eating?"

"Somewhere…fabulous."

"Fabulous is my specialty."

"We'll see."

"Go put on something nice…or rather nice for public."

"Your shirt isn't nice for public?"

"I want to be the only one who sees how glorious you look in it. Otherwise the universe will get jealous and try to take you from me."

She rose and walked over to him, straddled his lap so their faces were close together, and ran a gentle hand through his hair, looking directly and seriously into his eyes.

"No one will _ever_ take me from you. You are mine."

He smiled a flash of sorrow in his gaze, gave her a quick peck on the lips, and helped her off his lap.

"Go put on something gorgeous."

"_You're_ not on me," she replied playfully.

"You little tease."

She winked at him and headed off towards the wardrobe. Smiling, he located pants, trousers, and a suit jacket. Straightening his bowtie, he headed towards the console room. Paris of the 23rd century would have wonderful food, plus a nice peaceful atmosphere. They could wine and dine and head back to the Tardis.

She emerged in a sparkly blue dress and matching heels. Her hair was pulled away and up, pretty and practical in an up-do.

"Gorgeous." He kissed her again. He quite liked being able to do that. "Next stop…Paris."

**Two Hours Later**

"How did you manage to get into this?"

"Me? All I asked for was some extra bread!" She peered over top of their tipped-over table, currently being used as a shield from a raging robotic waiter.

"Well clearly, there's something wrong here!"

"Thanks Doctor, wouldn't have figured that one out!"

"Glad to be a help."

The robot was circling around and her blaster seemed to be having little effect on it. The sonic screwdriver wasn't appearing to do much good either. The robotic waiter rounded on them and zoomed towards the couple. River fired off a dozen shots and the Doctor was frantically trying to find the proper frequency to shut off the crazed metal maître d'. The 'bot approached and the Doctor slid in front of River, shielding her with his body. Unconcerned, the robot pushed him aside and opened a panel in its chest. Taking something from the compartment there, it thrust the thing into her face. River squeezed her eyes shut, certain that this was the end.

"Your wine, Madame," the robot bleeped aggressively.

She opened her eyes and tentatively accepted the glass.

"Drink it." Again, there was no room for question.

"I can't."

"It is an insult to the house to refuse the wine."

"I really can't. I have a condition."

"No allergies are detected. Drink the wine." How did the robot manage to sound so threatening?

River flashed a frantic look at the Doctor, and then looked back at the robot. She had really been hoping for a better way to break this to him.

"I can't. I'm pregnant."

The Doctor turned pale as a sheet and looked vaguely as though he was about to be sick. The robot scanned her, then took back the wine glass.

"May I interest you in our non-alcoholic beverage menu?"

"That would be lovely, thank you," she replied, in a shaken voice. Suddenly calm again, the formerly rampaging robot righted their table, set everything back into place, and bleeped in a polite French-accented voice,

"I will return shortly with your menu."

"Thanks," River said weakly.

Once the machine was gone, she turned to the Doctor, who looked utterly devastated.

"River…how…I thought that we were…" His eyes were beginning to tear up. He looked as though he was about to cry.

"It's your baby, love."

"Impossible," He told her tersely. "Humans and Time Lords cannot reproduce."

"Well I can promise you on your _name_ that since you began courting me, you're the only one I've slept with. And seeing as I'm only a few weeks along, you're the only possibility as the father."

"Humans and Time Lords cannot reproduce."

She knelt next to him and pressed her mouth to his, gently sucking on his lower lip, caressing his jawbone with her thumb. It was France, so no one particularly noticed or cared.

"Would I lie about this?" she whispered. "_Could_ I?"

Gently, she guided his hand to her still-flat belly.

"Can you feel that, Time Lord?"

He could. He, who could tell time period by smell and feel how fast the planet turned, could feel something there. He was astonished that he had never noticed it before. He had touched her so much in the past few months that it was a wonder he had not instantly known the difference. She helped him up and back into his seat. The robot returned with a drinks menu and River selected a sparkling apple juice. They ordered; she a salad and steak, he merely looked at the menu, then at the robot and said,

"Surprise me. I don't think it'll happen again today."

The robot, unconcerned by this unusual request, puttered away.

"You all right, sweetie?"

"It's not possible."

"It's you and I, sweetie. Anything is possible."

"Only with us," he muttered, still sounding very confused.

"I know. And once we've finished eating, we can go back to the Tardis and you can run all the tests you want. How does that sound?"

He nodded, finally back in a realm that he could understand.

"Is it a boy or a girl?"

"Much too early for that."

"I see."

Their food arrived. His was ratatouille; it wasn't a surprise, seeing as he had predicted the algorithm used for randomizing meals. One less surprise. It was probably a good thing. She wasn't sure he could handle another shock…she would have to wait until later to gloat.


	4. Under the Microscope

Under the Microscope

River had been scanned, poked, prodded, tested, sampled, and questioned to the point of insanity. Her Doctor, whom she loved dearly with all her heart, drove her to the breaking point. It took nearly three hours before she forcefully stood, shoving yet another scanning device in his hand away, and stomped back to the library.

"River, I haven't run all the tests yet!"

"Damn the tests. I'm done."

How had he not seen it sooner? Her mood had slowly and steadily blackened as he ran tests, completely ignoring the fact that she was a person and not a lab rat. Had she been Donna, she would have instantly bellowed,

"Stop bleepin' me!" at the first sight of a scanner, but she was not Donna. She was River Song. And he was an overexcited nerd, too interested in the science to notice that his wife was about to explode. As she stormed off to the back, he debated going after her. She was very rarely furious with him, so he hadn't quite mastered handling it yet. Instead of trying to deal with it, he began to compile what data he had into something that made sense. Speaking completely logically, this child was impossible. This _child_. Oh God.

The realization hit him like a blow to the stomach. _His_ child. River Song was pregnant with _his_ _child_. He swallowed, suddenly terrified. He had been a father before, but then it had all been normal. Reasonable. Entirely predictable. _This_ child was impossible and he wasn't even sure it would survive. Had he mentioned that aloud? Had he scared her? By the Tardis, she had to be as terrified as him; more so, seeing as she had never been a parent before. And also seeing as he had neglected to see how she was taking all of this. He was an idiot. Walking over, he smacked his head against a column with a resounding _thunk_. He was a complete and total idiot. He smacked his forehead against the column again for emphasis on his idiocy. And gathering his courage, he went off to find his wife.

XXXXXXXXXX  
>She was in the library, huddled in a corner behind an enormous galactic history book, crying. He had made her cry. Rassilon, he was an idiot. Carefully, he lifted the book away from her and sat down next to her in the corner, putting an arm around her.<p>

"Go away."

He pressed his lips to her temple and rested his forehead on her hair.

"Are you all right?"

"No, I'm not all right! I'm pregnant with a baby who shouldn't be allowed to exist; I've been prodded and poked for three hours by my _husband_ who completely neglected my feelings the whole time; I'm not even sure the baby will make it to term, seeing as miscarriage appears to run in my family; and I'm pretty damn sure that I'm not parent material!"

He rocked back and forth with her, carefully pulled her into his lap. She didn't resist, allowing herself to be enveloped by his arms. Her head rested on his shoulder and she could hear the faint four-beat pattern of his hearts. It was soothing, and she let her head slip onto his shoulder more heavily.

"I'm scared, Doctor."

"Shhhh. I know. It's all going to be all right."

She knew that he couldn't promise that and that he was just as confused as she was, but somehow, that made it better. In a voice so small and vulnerable that he instinctively held her tighter, she asked,

"Do you even want this baby?"

She could feel him smiling, could hear the love in his voice.

"Do I want to keep the life that I _made_ with you? River Song, how could you doubt it for even a moment?"

She responded with a watery chuckle.

"I'm scared," she repeated. "I can't do this alone."

"You don't have to. And if it helps, we can be scared together." He took her hand, kissing the palm before holding it in his own. "I'm not going to let anything happen to you or to this baby."

"Our baby," there was a hesitant smile in her voice.

"Our baby."

XXXXXXXXXXXX

After a lot more talking and reassurance, she allowed him to run more tests. All the while, they talked. She told him all about her childhood and he shared his with her. They talked about what it would be like to raise a child and where to do it and how. The Doctor was all for all of them staying in the Tardis, but River wanted a safer and more stable place. As much as she loved adventures and danger, you couldn't have a baby around things like that, even a half-Time Lord baby.

Once the scans had been run, he let the Tardis process the data and they ate dinner—ham sandwiches and grapes, eaten on the floor of the library as he read her favorite book aloud to her, then carefully massaged all the tension out of her shoulders and neck. He was slowly moving down to work on her middle back, when the Tardis bleeped. The data had all been processed. In a moment, she sat up, tightly-drawn like a bowstring, every muscle in her body tense.

"No matter what, it will all be all right," he told her. She had trouble believing him this time.

XXXXXXXXXXXXX

The results that came back were puzzling and cryptic.

"What?" she asked, "Is the baby okay?"

"Yes, developing on schedule so far but…this is odd."

"What?" she asked, alarmed.

"The DNA is strange. Nothing that will cause deformities or problems," he pulled her close to him, into the circle of his arms so that his two hearts beat against her back.

"Then what?"

"It's nearly all Time Lord DNA. I can see your DNA in there, the allele patterns and the mitochondrial DNA is yours, but the DNA is that of a Time Lord. It's like your DNA was converted to Time Lord DNA so it would be compatible with mine. But that's impossible."

They were both silent for a long moment, both thinking of how it could be possible.

"What about…that day I fell out of the Tardis?"

"Into the time stream…yes! Brilliant!" She winced as he shouted excitedly into her ear. She could almost see his mind processing all of the information at a million miles an hour, working it all out.

"Your DNA could have been altered so minimally that it would still appear human while really being very like that of a Time Lord! The exposure to the time stream would have made you more sensitive to time energy and goodness knows the Tardis would help with that as would…" he cleared his throat, "having close and frequent contact with….um…me…" He was blushing and she smiled a little.

"What about the baby?"

"Well there's never been an event where a human mother carried a Time Lord baby. So we'll have to keep a close eye on you. And find a doctor nearly as brilliant as me. Someone with discretion and skill in the unusual. Someone—"

"Like my grandmother?"

He managed to look extremely pleased and extremely uncomfortable at the same time.

"Well…yes."

It would soon be _his_ turn to be under the microscope.


	5. Timing is Everything

Timing is Everything

When she was in her early teenage years and began complaining about boys not liking her or never finding someone she liked, her grandmother was a calming balance for River. Her mother shook her head and made disappointed clucking noises at her, but was really of little help. River supposed she could understand that; her mother was beautiful, always had been, and would continue to be as long as River saw her. She fell ill and became deaf and mute around when River was obtaining her first Master's degree, but she remained stunning, even in her newly silent world. Her grandmother, on the other hand, always told her with a calm assurance that she would find someone perfect for her.

River's grandmother was an entirely different story. Her father's mother, the woman was brilliant and gritty. She insisted on growing a _vegetable garden_ of all things in her backyard, and in the actual soil rather than using the so much more convenient hydroponics systems. She believed in making things herself, and when that wasn't possible, getting them from someone who did. River believed that her grandmother was the sole reason that the flea market idea came back and thrived in their town; everyone wanted the colorful, unique look of her grandmother's home.

She was brilliant, was the other thing. After finding the cure for cellular commutalia, she spent most of her life doing research on government grants. She cured a few minor diseases and was content to be the town's unofficial local practitioner, but her true passion lay in her home and in her research. The woman was unstoppable, an unshakeable giant in River's memories. She still visited from time to time, but after her grandfather's death, her grandmother, Sophia, had thrown herself so much into research that she was rarely free for visits.

The blue box materialized loudly into the backyard, one corner of it bending a wandering tomato vine. The Doctor smiled and strode out.

"Well isn't this lovely? Nice little patch of earthiness back here, eh River?"

River Song walked out of the box to stand next to her husband. Something wasn't quite right, but she couldn't put her finger on it. As the back door opened and a smiling woman emerged, her pale grey curls laced with blonde, River realized what was wrong. A swing hung from a tree in the backyard; it had been replaced with a more mature version when she turned ten. That meant…oh dear.

"Lacy?" River's mother's name. This was all wrong.

"No grandma, it's me…River."

Time travel was already vaguely known of; the Time Agency's vortex manipulators were the sort of distant but existent technology that was used only by and for the Agency, and oftentimes the government. Her grandmother had scoffed at the idea of time travel, but young River Song was fascinated by the idea. She liked to pretend that she was going back to all the places she read about in her books. It was not uncommon for her child-self to have imaginary expeditions in the very backyard that she was standing in with her husband.

"River Song? She's only seven."

"Hallo, I'm the Doctor." Her husband made short work of striding forward and holding out his hand.

"Doctor…?"

"Oh just the Doctor."

"Sophia D 'Angelo, pleased to make your acquaintance."

"D 'Angelo? I thought you were River's paternal grandmother."

"She kept her last name, dear," River explained wearily. All she really wanted to do was sit down and figure out what was going on. Her grandmother looked her up and down.

"Well then, if you _are_ my River, then you should make short work of these questions."

"Can we sit down?"

"If you don't mind fetching a few chairs from the shed," her grandmother replied.

"Doctor, do be a dear and go around the left side of the house. The chairs should be under a pile of beach mats in the shed. The blue one, not the green one; the green one has seedlings in it."

Sophia nodded approvingly and called back towards the house,

"Tom! Come out here would you? And bring a tray with some lemonade and those buns from Margery?"

"Margery's a terrible baker, grandma…" River began, and a male voice bellowed back from inside the house,

"Do you mean Kelly's buns? That's all we've got."

"Yes, thank you!"

"What color is your bedroom right now?"

"I'm seven in your time? Oh…depending on the month it's either green or blue. Mom let grandpa and me paint it this summer, and we did it to look like the sky."

"What does your father do?"

"He's a pilot, but only on-planet. He only flies off-planet on special request."

"And your mother?"

"She's a party planner."

"And how many brothers and sisters do you have?"

"None…grandma everyone knows that."

"How many miscarriages has your mother had?"

River frowned, her face growing a tense, worried look. She calculated it up in her head, if she was seven at this time…that would bring the number of miscarriages up to…three.

"Three."

"And what is your very favorite thing to eat at our house, the one we don't tell your mother about?"

"Chocolate-peanut butter balls, with the cream on top."

She nodded as the Doctor came around the house, toting several wood-and-canvas folding chairs. At the same time, her grandfather, Tom, opened the back door while carrying a tray with a pitcher of lemonade and some yeast buns on it. Cups, butter, jam, and marmalade were all balanced on the edge of it and Sophie got up to get the little table leaning up against the wall next to the door. She set it out on the grass and Tom set down the tray as the Doctor set out four chairs around the table.

"Well then, as you've proven you are my granddaughter, what brings you back to my house?"

"Poor piloting skills," River grumbled, shooting a glance at her husband. "We meant to meet you much later. To the you I know now."

"Well, I suppose it can't be helped now. Just visiting?" Sophie poured lemonade into glasses and handed them to River and the Doctor. Tom had already poured himself a glass and was spreading jam on a bun. The Doctor helped himself to the marmalade, piling it onto the bun until River elbowed him into stopping.

"Not exactly, no. We're here because you're reasonably brilliant and I wanted a second opinion," the Doctor replied, trying to put a little more marmalade on his bun without River noticing. She did notice and subsequently moved the marmalade pot out of his reach.

"Reasonably brilliant?" Sophie seemed amused rather than annoyed.

"Well for a human, you're brilliant."

"And you're married to this one?" Sophie asked her granddaughter.

"How did you know?"

"Other than the ring and the fact that you two act like a married couple? Call it a good guess."

River blushed and the Doctor looked over at her, astonished. She didn't blush. She made _him_ blush, but she didn't blush. He grinned and took an enormous bite of marmalade-covered bread. He _liked_ Sophie.

After a little more lighthearted banter about not being invited to the wedding (which she was reassured that she would be) Sophie steered the conversation back to the reason they had come. Tom followed the conversation silently, smiling in all the right places. He was a man of few words.

"Now River, why have you come to see me?"

"Well," she rubbed her lips together, distributing her lipstick over them. "I'm pregnant."

Her grandfather took this with a cool nod, and her grandmother with a smile.

"That's lovely dear, but it doesn't require me being brilliant."

"Ah, that's where the clever bit comes in," the Doctor piped in through a mouthful of marmalade. "You see, I'm not human. I'm a Time Lord, last of. And humans and Time Lords can't reproduce. Only we have, and I think that it's because she's been exposed to the raw time stream, causing the child's DNA to be altered so it's ninety-eight to one hundred percent Time Lord. And seeing as there's never been a child like this before, we decided to find a brilliant doctor, other than me, to help keep an eye on things and help us plan in case things don't follow the normal span of human pregnancy."

Tom took this time to get up and go back into the house as Sophie blinked, looking rather astonished, back at the couple before her. In her mind, River Song was only seven years old, and the idea of her having sex, let alone being pregnant, not to mention with an _alien_ child, was all a bit disconcerting. She took a minute or so to get acquainted with the idea, and during that time, Tom came back out.

"I think things can be done better in the lab, hon."

Sophie nodded, snapping into doctor-mode, and smiled cheerily at her granddaughter and grandson-in-law.

"No time to waste then. We have a dozen tests to run and—"

"Hang on a moment; these might help." The Doctor dug into his jacket pocket and pulled out a manila envelope folded in half.

"I've got all the scans and tests inside, and helpfully translated into good old New Earth Standard too."

"Good; that will save time." She began to walk towards the house, looking through the papers. Following behind her, River and the Doctor could make out some of her mutterings; things like 'I see', or 'that's interesting', or 'odd, but we'll manage'. Quietly behind her, they followed her downstairs into the basement, an area that River hadn't been allowed in until her mid-teens. Grandma's lab was off limits.

There was an examining table in one corner, but it was mostly machines and blinking lights and control panels and tubes. The area was huge and white, medically clean. The instruments gleamed silver and the computers were a polished onyx, their screens off to save power. It was perhaps the size of a school gymnasium, only without the bleachers and the smell of sweaty socks. The Doctor looked rather excited, but River grabbed his hand firmly within her own and smiled tightly at him. Through her teeth she growled mildly menacingly,

"Do. Not. Touch. Anything."

Though he pouted, he continued holding her hand and looked longingly at the computers and silvery instruments. She barely contained the urge to shove her hand in his jacket pocket and pull out the sonic screwdriver, just to be safe. Reminding herself that he was very much an adult, she resisted the urge. Barely.

"All right," Sophie said, thrusting River out of her thoughts, "I think the main thing right now is to take a few pictures of that baby and see what she looks like. All right?"

"You said we wouldn't know whether it was a boy or a girl!" the Doctor accused.

"All babies are female; it's only the addition of testosterone to the fetus later on that makes them male."

"Oh." Gallifreyan pregnancies were the same, he assumed. He had never bothered to really ask.

"All right, let's get those clothes off of you, and we'll get you right into the scanner."

"Clothes?" the Doctor squeaked.

"Not you, your wife. And yes, the scans are best done without the interference of clothing. I could ask her to step behind the screen, but I assume that you've already seen her naked."

"Well, um, yes. But I really—are you sure it's necessary?"

"For maximum accuracy, yes," Sophie replied firmly. "You may turn around or wait upstairs if it makes you more comfortable." Her tone indicated that she would think a good deal less of him if he did choose either of her alternatives.

"No, really. I'm fine. Don't mind me, won't be a bother at all." All of this was said in a slightly higher-pitched tone. He visibly swallowed.

"Excellent. River, your clothes; the machine is over here."

As her grandmother turned to program the scanner, River raised her eyebrows at the Doctor and slowly began to undo the buttons of her double-breasted military-style jacket, keeping her eyes on him the whole time. The Doctor kept his face stony, and though he was sweating, desperately tried to think of other things. It was all well and good for his wife to remove her clothes for him in private, but he would have preferred that her grandmother wasn't present to see the physical reactions that it elicited from him.

She peeled off her top and undid the fastenings of her trousers, eyes never leaving his, a sultry smile across her lips. She was _enjoying_ this, the little temptress. He could feel his mind slipping away, but he tried to focus on something else. There was a beeping in the background. How often did it beep? Were there different tones? It took him only moments to figure out and as he tried to think of other things…oh Rassilon she wasn't wearing a bra anymore.

Or panties.

Rassilon.

Maybe if he thought the name enough times, it would take his mind off the absolutely stunning naked woman standing before him. He could not react; he would not _allow_ his body to react. He would not be caught off guard here, in his _grandmother-in-law's_ basement laboratory. He would have liked to take revenge by whispering rather inappropriate promises to her in Gallifreyan, (unsurprisingly, she learned all the dirty things first) but he did not think that he would be able to keep control of himself if he did so. He would have to save it for another time.

"All right then love, stop tempting the poor man and get into the scanner."

The scanner looked somewhat like a circular shower stall with a curtain all around it. Only the 'curtain' was made entirely of little information-collecting scanner eyes. They clicked and beeped quietly as River stepped in.

"Legs shoulder-length apart and both wrists on your head please, dear; we don't want those arms getting in the way. The scanner should be able to see the baby from all angles."

River winked at her husband, whom shoved his clenched fists into his pockets and thought about how the scanner worked instead of the silhouette of his wife. It all took less than five minutes, and when she stepped out; she put her clothes back on in a businesslike fashion.

"All right, the scanner will take a few hours to process everything. Would you like to stay for supper? Your grandfather is cooking."

"That would be great, grandma, thanks."

"Very polite," the Doctor mumbled, still a bit annoyed at River for being such a tease. She playfully kissed his cheek and asked,

"Do you mind if we take a walk? I want to show the Doctor around."

"Supper won't be for another hour, so feel free."

River took her husband by the hand and walked out the front door, ready to take a step into the past.


	6. Dinner Conversation

Dinner Conversation

They walked around her childhood town, carefully avoiding her house. She would have liked to show it to him, but the chances of crossing her own timeline were too high. So instead she showed him the community park where she played, and later dug, as a child. She showed him the little corner store where she would purchase floaty shakes and atomic shock candies, and the school where she spent her primary years. Through the neighborhoods they strolled and she pointed out houses of friends and schoolmates, telling him little snippets of their lives. It was very nostalgic for her and very informative for him, so both of them were content.

She showed him the hover-disk courts where she was tragically beaten in a tournament when she was thirteen.

"I swear to you, Silvia Meyers cheated," River insisted, as her husband looked on, chuckling.

"Always been competitive, eh River?"

"Cheeky," she muttered, eyes twinkling.

They couldn't tour her schools without identification so they didn't. Instead, she took him to the shooting range that she had gone to as soon as she was allowed to, and then the holo-theatre. They had a little time to kill and a re-re-remake of the original Casablanca was playing. River smiled as they slipped into the back row; they were a little late, the show had already started.

"You know, this is where I snogged for the first time," she whispered mischievously to her husband.

"Is that so?" he asked mildly, ignoring her in favor of the film. She pouted; she had hoped to make him a little jealous.

"His name was Danny Yates and he was the handsomest boy in our grade." She purred it into his ear.

"That's nice."

"He stuck his tongue in my mouth."

"Mmm?"

"And when we were finished, I had his gum."

"Really?" He was ignoring her, the tease.

"Yes, really. And I let him put his hands up my shirt. His hands were really warm, so it wasn't a bother and—"

"River, really. If you don't mind, I'm trying to watch the film," he whispered at her, politely indignant.

She slumped in her seat a little and pouted. She sat that way for all of three minutes, when he whispered back,

"The first girl I snogged was Renee Torres; or that's the approximate translation of her name anyway. She wasn't the prettiest girl in our year, but she was the brightest. That girl did things with her tongue that rocked my metaphorical world. I swear, for _weeks_ afterwards, I couldn't lick an ice cream cone or have cereal without thinking of all the lovely things her tongue did inside my mouth. I'm not sure if she was especially gifted from practice or was just well-endowed in the tongue department, but let me tell _you_—"

He couldn't finish the sentence because his wife had gotten up out of her chair, straddled his lap, and was making short work of blowing Renee Torres's performance out of the water. When they stopped to breathe for a moment, he smiled at her, a twinkle of triumph in his gaze, he whispered against her lips,

"It's not nice to tempt people, is it, love?"

She responded by sliding his hands up her shirt and reacquainting herself with the inside of his mouth. It was, in his opinion, a more than sufficient response.

Once the snog-session was over (though the film was not) they left and walked slowly back to her grandmother's house, hands entwined. They paused on the stoop to reapply lipstick (in River's case) and removed lipstick from his face (the Doctor's case). After a minute of making themselves presentable, they walked in. Wafting out of the open door like a siren's song of smells, the scents of food cooking overwhelmed them. Yeasty bread and butter, roasting meat, steaming vegetables, and the smell of butter melting all blended together in a mouth-wateringly good smell.

"It smells wonderful in here," River commented as they walked into the kitchen.

"Well it'll taste wonderful too if you give me another five minutes," her grandfather said with a smile. "Now be a good girl and go help your grandmother set the table."

The Doctor turned to leave with her, but smiling, Tom ordered,

"Not you, sir. I need your help with something."

Beaming helpfully, the Doctor turned on his heel and waited for instruction. Tom watched River leave the room, and then he pressed a button next to the sink. The noises outside the kitchen were cut off. The Doctor turned his attention to the little panel with the button on it.

"A privacy field? Brilliant, I haven't seen one of these in ages."

"How long have you been having sex with my granddaughter?" It was said in such a pleasant and non-menacing tone, that the Doctor whirled to face Tom.

"I beg your pardon?"

"You heard me; how long have you been having sex with my granddaughter?"

The Time Lord's mouth opened and closed slowly several times; for once he was at a loss for words.

"I assure you, Doctor, that if you don't answer me now, my wife will have no trouble asking you the same question halfway through your meal."

"I see."

"Excellent. Now shall I voice the question a third time, or did you understand it the first two?" He continued speaking as he pulled a roast from the oven and set it on a platter. Pulling an enormous laser-blade from a kitchen drawer, Tom began to cut the meat into thin, even slices.

"And while you're at it, pour the juice from the roast-pan into that saucepan; we need to start the gravy."

The Doctor obeyed, and once he had finished, Tom fired off more instructions about how to go about making the gravy. Once it was bubbling nicely, the Doctor, not looking up from stirring, replied.

"A little over half of a year, now; we were married eight months ago."

"Ah, a traditionalist; I'm sure that River didn't think much of that."

"She understood."

Tom chuckled as he cut another slice of meat.

"I hope you understand, Time Lord, that if you break our little girl's heart, there isn't a time or place far away enough to run. And if she doesn't manage to take you out first, I gladly will."

"Oh that's very understood," the Doctor reassured him, the words rushing from his mouth.

"Good." Tom smiled at him and looked at the gravy. "Stir that a little more, will you? Don't want it to go lumpy." And with that, the old man had turned off the privacy field and taken a platter of roast into the dining room.

"Nobody's relatives fancy me," the Doctor muttered to himself, pouting a little.

"Well better here than the dinner table," Sophie replied, walking into the kitchen. "Though I'm sure that it would have made fascinating dinner conversation; people's sex lives often do."


	7. Diagnosis

Diagnosis

Supper was lighthearted and once the Doctor recovered a little after his encounter with River's grandfather, he had a lovely time. Both her grandparents were clever and quick-witted, though Sophie's humor was more involving obscure literary references and wit, while Tom's involved dry, dead-panned comments in the pauses in conversation that set them all into another loop of talk and laughter. They were _right_ for River, these people. She scarcely mentioned her parents to him during the walk, but these people were exactly the sort of people he could see bringing her up. She had her grandmother's quick mind and her grandfather's dry sarcasm with the brilliance of both of them.

_They practically raised her,_ he found himself thinking. How else could she be so similar to them? She must have spent a lot of time here…he would have to ask her about it later.

The food was good, the conversation stimulating, and there was plum wine, red and sweet. River eyed it longingly; she loved a good wine. The Doctor enjoyed his, but drank very little, compared to her family members, who each had two or three glasses without appearing to be affected at all. _Wine is commonplace here_, he thought. His wife had told him a great deal about her childhood today, but he was stunned at the amount she _hadn't_ told him. She had said nothing about how she lived at home, what her parents were like. It didn't even occur to him that she had left all this out until just then, as he was taking another sip of the plum wine.

His thoughts were interrupted by a,

"Right, Doctor?"

The table was looking expectedly at him and he blinked, realizing that he hadn't been listening.

"Sorry?"

"Superior concentration indeed," Tom remarked dryly and River chuckled.

"Are we laughing at my expense?" The Doctor asked his wife, lowering his voice slightly.

"Very much so."

"Excellent; we might as well continue. Did I ever tell you about the time I met Genghis Kahn?"

The conversation rolled on and he brushed away his previous musings, saving them for later. After they had finished dinner, there was dessert, chocolate strawberry pie. River enjoyed two slices of that, explaining to the pouting Doctor (she had stolen the last slice, which he wanted to have as his second slice) that since she didn't get any of the wine, it was only fair that she got the other piece of pie. He didn't like it much, but she allowed him one bite and he settled with that.

After supper was finished, Tom collected plates and Sophie loaded the dishes into the particle scrubber for cleaning. The floor was cleaned by a scooter-sucker-bot, affectionately called Benji. The kitchen was tidied and once all that was finished, Sophie lead the way back to her lab, River, the Doctor, and Tom trailing behind. The scanner spat out papers onto the desk as Sophie delicately typed commands into the keyboard. She peered at the lines and lines of what looked like gibberish, a mixture of confusion and amazement on her face. Finally, a piece of plastic slipped out of the machine and Sophie tapped it with a fingernail. The paper lit up.

"I've saved everything on a portable drive for you to take with you; I've kept a copy so that if you come back, I'll still have the data. _Now_, the fun part. This little blob right here is your baby."

They both leaned in rapidly, nearly bumping heads in the process. On the little glowing piece of plastic was a blob. It was the most beautiful blob that River had ever seen.

"You're actually about five and a half weeks pregnant, River," her grandmother said.

"Really?" It all seemed to be happening in a giant fuzzy cloud of happiness. Nothing could touch her here. This was her baby. Hers and the Doctor's baby, the best thing they had ever done by far.

"Isn't she brilliant?" her husband whispered, tracing the little blob with his fingertip, gently, as though not to break it.

"If you two are going to go all gooey and new-parents on me, I won't be able to tell you the rest of the lab results. You can be senseless and fawning in a minute." She plucked the sheet from their hands and showed them some printouts.

"Everything's developing on schedule for the baby. One brain, one heart, one spinal cord; it doesn't look like the time travel has done anything to it."

"One heart?" River asked, alarmed.

"We're not born with two, love." He was smiling when he said it, so Sophie chuckled along with him, but River merely looked at him, curious.

"I can explain the whole thing later if you like."

"River, what is all this nonsense?" Sophie asked in her typical no-fuss manner.

"He's got two hearts; it one of those things about being an alien."

"Well if they're not born with two, then your baby is right on schedule. It all looks very good right now. I'd advise a checkup in about a month; keep the papers and the data drive with you, and bring them the next time we meet. If we both keep data copies, I might end up with more information than you some of the time, and vice versa, so we should be able to share."

"Great," River sounded relieved and she inadvertently smoothed her flat stomach. She wondered how long it would take for their little baby to begin to make herself known, to round her smooth belly and to begin affecting moods, diet, and other things. The Doctor was looking at her belly too and she guessed that he was thinking the same thing.

"Well here are your papers and your drive and your picture."

"Thank you so much, grandma."

"Come back soon, lovely."

"I'll see you tomorrow, grandma. Or little-me will anyhow."

"I'm so proud of you, dear. You've found yourself a good man, and you look happy. Seeing you happy is all I ever asked for."

"Thanks, grandma."

There were hugs and farewells and the Doctor and River were somehow back in the Tardis, information in hand.

"Have you got any books on Time Lord biology and development?"

"In the library, yeah; do you want to see them?"

"No, I only asked for my health." He could see where she had gotten her dry wit.

"Well do you mind if we leave your grandparents' backyard first, or shall I drop everything to please her majesty?"

"Just don't take too long," River replied with an exaggerated sigh, "You know how tiring it is to watch you work."

The Doctor grinned, threw a few levers, hit a button or two, and used a rubber mallet to smack something into place. The Tardis took off, and he strode towards the library, his wife following behind. They had so much to learn about.

XXXXXXXXXXXX

River spent weeks reading through anything and everything she could get on Time Lord biology. Her Gallifreyan was getting much better; she could hold entirely intelligent conversations with him with very little bother. Her vocabulary was superb; she actually requested that he speak only in Gallifreyan so that she could learn quicker. High Gallifreyan was simple after that; it was really only a few new conjugations, a new way of saying a few things, the addition of totally unnecessary formalities. She supposed that's why it was High Gallifreyan instead of the usual kind. She gobbled books and made notes in another notebook, not her usual blue. This one was soft peachy-colored leather, held closed with a ribbon. Inside it went carefully-sketched diagrams, notes about normal development, and then in a different color, how she was developing. They were similar most of the time, and also similar to human development. She took great delight in telling the Doctor what the baby was growing that particular week.

She was a week and a half into the second trimester that things began to get tricky. And it all started with a very innocent spinach omelet with cheddar cheese.


	8. Not A China Doll

Not a China Doll

They were on an adventure, or as much of an adventure as one could have at a flea market…actually they'd had several at flea markets, but he had taken great pains to ensure that there were no wars or conflicts or mysterious going-ons during this day. River had asked, no, _demanded_ to go somewhere, insisting vehemently,

"Just because I'm pregnant doesn't mean I'm a china doll. I want to go _do_ something, damn it!"

And so here they were, at the flea market on Fissile 7 (Best deals in the galaxy!) perusing the wears. River particularly liked the black market area, where she was inspecting a very shiny, very stolen plasma-pistol.

"We came all the way out here, there are artifacts from a dozen galaxies, and you're looking at the guns."

"Hush now, I'm busy."

"River, inevitably someone is going to get shot while we're standing here. And I'd really rather go have lunch."

She shot him an annoyed look, but flicked her gaze back to the vender.

"I'll give you eighty credits for it."

"It's worth at least two hundred."

"It's stolen and the serial number's still on it. Not to mention, the plasma filter is clogged and it could go up at any minute. You'd be lucky to get sixty, but I'm being generous."

"One hundred and ten, then, but that's my final offer."

"Ninety is more than fair."

"Ninety is fair? Are you trying to starve my family? No, I will give ninety-eight."

"Ninety five is my last offer, or I'm going two booths down, where I know he'll give it to me for cheaper."

"Fine, ninety-five, but you are one cold-hearted woman, starving my children this way."

"Save it for someone who believes you."

The gun was wrapped and boxed and bagged before River strolled off with the bag on her arm, looking very satisfied. The Doctor kept his gaze flickering about; it would be just typical for a gunfight to go off as they were leaving. He wasn't having his unborn child exposed to that kind of danger. Thankfully, they made it out of the Shadow District without any fuss and moved on to the Green District, where they sold food and drink.

"What do you fancy?"

"Something with spinach I think; the baby seems to want spinach."

"Well who am I to deny the baby?"

"You had no trouble with it last night when the baby wanted the last pudding cup."

"It was banana flavored! I had already opened it and taken three bites!"

"I'm just saying," River chuckled teasingly, "You aren't nearly as selfless and you say."

"I didn't _say_," the Doctor began to mutter petulantly, but River silenced him with a smile and a quick peck on the cheek.

"Don't be such a spoilsport; have you seen all the amazing things they're selling here?"

"Well yes, I was trying to show them to you while you were buying your…tools."

They bickered playfully all the way down the rows of stalls, looking for something with spinach in it to satisfy their little Time Tot. The Doctor plucked and munched on little shrimp puffs and rolls stuffed with something River couldn't quite pronounce. She ate sushi as they searched high and low for spinachy foods.

They found the answer to her cravings in the form of a spinach omelet topped with cheddar cheese. Without bothering to barter, she tossed several coins on the counter and grabbed the omelet and a fork, not bothering to check if it was hot before forking a large bite into her mouth. The vender chuckled as she opened her mouth and tried to chew while at the same time not burning her tongue.

"Pregnant, eh?" the man chuckled as River swallowed and gulped a bottle of water that the Doctor offered her.

"How'd you guess?"

"The starving ones go for bread or meat; something plain and quick and easy to scarf down."

"Well I can see how that would work," the Doctor remarked.

River was eating the omelet slower now, taking her time and savoring the taste. She smiled at her husband, a little spinach stuck in between her two front teeth.

"You've got something just there." He tapped the gap between his teeth to show her where, and she made an odd face, probed the area with her tongue, and then smiled again, this time spinach-free.

"Better?"

The Doctor nodded and grinned right back at her.

"Not so high-and-mighty now, are we?"

"Shut up or you're sleeping on the floor tonight."

"I think we can manage on the floor just as well as we can on the bed…or the couch..."

She rolled her eyes.

"Cute."

"Aren't I just?"

"It's a good thing we're married or I might have to threaten leaving you."

"So do it."

"Maybe I will."

She took another bite of omelet, which didn't emphasize her point at all. If anything, it made her look like she had given up.

"It's a good thing I love you," she muttered through a forkful of omelet.

"It's a good thing I—River, are you all right?"

Her face had suddenly gone a delicate shade of green and her lips were grey around the edges. She opened her mouth a little, inhaling sharply before she dropped her plate of omelet and vomited violently all over her own shoes and the ground.

He held her hair away from her face and when she had finished, he let her rinse her mouth out with a little water.

"You all right, love?"

She nodded, her face still rather green.

"Let's get you back to the Tardis; maybe you've got a bit of a virus."

She nodded and they walked back to their spaceship.

XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX

She hadn't eaten almost anything in the past three days. She nibbled on crackers or a little bit of banana in between violent bouts of nausea. She drank an outrageous amount of water, which did not make her sick, and at least made sure she was hydrated.

"Morning sickness…Time Lords…books." This was all she managed to say before she threw up again. He rubbed her back and got her a glass of water before he rushed off to the library.

"Morning sickness is common in Gallifreyan pregnancies, but it usually occurs a bit later than this, and is not nearly as bad."

"Great; worst of both worlds," River managed before dry-heaving into the bucket in her lap. It was her constant companion as of late, along with an enormous bottle of water, prenatal vitamins, and a package of wheat crackers. None of the teas or herbal cures or diets had worked. Her morning sickness was an intense and near-constant figure in her life for about two weeks.

Once it was over, she had lost about ten pounds and looked pale and drawn. It was about then that they made a decision together that it was time for another visit to River's grandmother to check on the baby. River felt terribly guilty about not being able to keep food down for her child's sake, even though the Doctor assured her again and again that there was nothing that she could do about it. However, they agreed that it was important to see if the lack of nutrition had hurt the baby.

They ate chicken stir-fry before they went anywhere; the Doctor insisted that she begin eating again and had no concerns about her eating whatever she wanted. So they ate chicken stir-fry and had boysenberry yogurt for dessert. She ate hers with a pickle on the side.


	9. Not Cleverer, Better Informed

Not Cleverer, Better Informed

They touched down in Tom and Sophie's backyard and she is out there almost immediately. She is older now, though not as old as she was in River's original timeline. Tom was nowhere in sight and for a moment River's heart dropped, but her grandmother smiled brightly.

"Tom's put some of your tea on, dear. And Doctor, you're looking well. Last time we saw you, you were a nervous wreck!"

The Doctor frowned momentarily and then smiled back, a little hesitant.

"The last time you saw me, how far along was River?"

"That was…oh about a week ago; River was about ten months along."

"Ten months?" River started, "Grandma, Time Lords carry for an average of nine and a half months!"

"Well you're baby wasn't to term. I estimated that you wouldn't be delivering for at least another two weeks."

River paled at the thought of carrying a child for that long, but smiled weakly and followed her grandmother indoors.

"How far along are you right now, dear?"

"She spent the last two weeks throwing up nearly constantly," the Doctor interjected helpfully.

"About eleven weeks," River replied.

"I have all the notes about this check-up; you gave them to me when you came in for your twenty-week appointment."

"And?"

"No malnourishment on the baby's part. Those prenatal vitamins you took seemed to make it into your system, even if the food didn't. Let me upload all the data for you."

The Doctor took his data drive and followed Sophie into her basement laboratory as River wandered into the kitchen to see her grandfather.

Tom was paler than usual and a little thinner, but still looked cheery. River tried to place him in her mind, figure out how much longer he had to live. She could tell he was already sick; there was a sickly undertone, barely there, to his skin. He smiled at her and poured water into a mug for her.

"I made your tea."

"My tea?"

"It's good for the baby. When you got your second round of morning sickness, this helped."

"_Second_ round?" River paled at the thought of any more morning sickness. She was through with vomiting for the rest of her life.

"Yes, it starts about two weeks after the first round and lasts about a week…oh drat. I'm at the wrong bit of timeline, aren't I? Your grandmother is a lot better at this than I am." There was a twinkle in his eye that told her he had meant for her to know.

"I suppose she is."

River sipped the tea. It was warm and tasted of cinnamon and cloves and chilly autumn days. Her stomach seemed to relax; any time she ate something she felt a little twinge of panic, fearing that she may have to rush to the toilet or a trash can. It was good to know that she wouldn't have to worry about it for at least a week. She sat down at the counter and Tom looked her over.

"You're much too skinny for a pregnant lady. Are you hungry?"

River nodded and her grandfather smiled, tossing vegetables and fish into a frying pan.

"Your grandmother and I have gotten used to buying fresh local fish, and they laser-cut it so all the parasites are killed. One hundred percent safe for my little girl and my great-grandchild." He smiled at River, then at her belly as he poured a little olive oil into the pan and plucked leaves from the herb garden on the windowsill, tossing them into the pan.

"How's he taking fatherhood?"

"Really well so far," River told him with a smile, "He was really wonderful about looking after me when I was ill and he leaves out my vitamins for me to take in the morning. The man forgets his pants every now and again, but every morning without fail, he remembers my prenatal vitamins."

Tom laughed, "That sounds like the man you described on your last visit."

"So he continues to handle it well?"

Tom laughed and wagged a finger at her. "No sneak-peeks for you, missy."

There was hot food for her on a plate and it tasted so divine, half because she knew she wasn't going to throw it up. She was still practically inhaling fish and vegetables when her husband and her grandmother came up the stairs, bickering as they did.

"You're not cleverer than I am; I could have worked it out!"

"Then why didn't you?"

"I didn't have all the information I needed!"

"So? If you're so clever, why did you need it?"

"You're better informed than I am, that doesn't make you cleverer. You've just met me later in my timeline. I wasn't cleverer than River when I first met her; I am just a Time Lord. We're naturally smarter than humans. It's just a fact of life."

"Right. So what you're saying is you could work out any problem I could?"

"Yes, and probably faster as well."

"How do you deliver a baby?"

The Doctor had nothing to say to that for a moment.

"Well…you tell her to push…and then the baby just sort of pops out…"

"And what if the baby is breech?"

"Well…um…"

"Let her have it, sweetie. You're just going to work yourself up over this." River swallowed her broccoli and smiled at her husband before slipping another bite into her mouth.

"I _am_ cleverer, River."

She pulled him to her by the hem of his jacket and pulled him into a sitting position before patting his cheek and giving him a quick kiss.

"I know you are, sweetie," she said in Gallifreyan, "But play nice with my family."

"She started it," he muttered petulantly in the same language.

"I'm sure she did. Would you like a bite?" She offered him her fork and he accepted the taste of fish and vegetables.

"This is fantastic," he exclaimed, switching back to English.

"Thank you, Doctor. Would you like some?" Tom offered him a plate, which he accepted.

"So the baby's fine?"

"Well, I want to do the scans anyway, even though we already have the data. It has to start somewhere, right? It can't just be a loop that comes from nowhere."

The Doctor shrugged, not really listening as he too devoured the food that River's grandfather had set out for them.

"River, if you're finished, why don't we do the scans while the Doctor eats?"

River nodded and slipped from her seat, whispering,

"Behave yourself," to her husband as she trotted off after her grandmother.

"Only if you do," he muttered back, and she flashed him a coy grin before descending into the basement.

XXXXXXXXXXXXXXX

After River had been scanned, tested, and checked and a recipe for the tea that soothed her morning sickness was acquired, they departed. River pouted up at her husband pleadingly as soon as he settled the Tardis in the time stream to safely drift.

"Can we go do something?"

"The last time we did something, you ended up vomiting for two weeks."

"Well that wasn't exactly the fault of the expedition, that was just poor timing."

The Doctor couldn't believe that he was turning down an adventure, but it seemed that he was. He prayed that being a father wouldn't make him boring. He couldn't bear being boring. He hadn't been boring on Gallifrey. His children hadn't made him into an old bore back then.

"River, I think maybe you should take the time to rest."

"Rest? I've got a little over a week before I'm puking my guts out again! We need to go do something before all that!"

"Well maybe _I'm_ tired." He wasn't, but that wasn't the point.

River's expression became suspiciously innocent.

"You're tired? Poor thing, maybe you'd like to just take off your coat and shoes and have a nice lie-down?"

She slipped his jacket from his shoulders and tossed it over the bench seat near the console, then tugged at his bowtie, untying it. She unbuttoned the first three buttons of his shirt and rested a hand on his bare chest before sliding it down to his waistline, where she tugged his shirt upward until it was no longer tucked in.

"Feeling a little drained, Doctor? A bit like going to bed?"

He smiled at her in a mildly superior manner.

"River, I'm a Time Lord. I can control my desires, you know."

She smiled at him, looking a little feral.

"Is that so, darling?"

And her hands were suddenly everywhere. Sliding, stroking, caressing up and down his sides. Her hands stayed away from his groin; that would be easy. She wanted him to admit that he was wrong, that he wasn't nearly as high-and-mighty as he claimed to be. His cheeks were already a bit pink, his pupils beginning to dilate.

She murmured things into his ear in Gallifreyan, such _naughty_ things. He licked his lips,

"Now River," he began, sounding a little distracted.

"Yes, Doctor?"

And then her mouth was on his, warm and hungry; her teeth tugged at his lower lip, her tongue knew exactly how to make him moan. She smiled a little against his lips as he began to respond to her ministrations. It was then that she pulled away, tilting her head to the side, smiling seductively.

"You can control your desires, Doctor?" she whispered, "Is that so?"

"Shut up, Song," he growled and pinned her to a column, attacking her lips with a fervor that rivaled his brilliance.

A long while later, after they lay sprawled in his bed, she snuggled closer to his side and whispered against his ear, lips brushing his skin tantalizingly,

"I win."

Voice warm and content, he pulled her closer, pressing his lips to hers.

"Yes you do."

And for a long while, they lay there, comfortable in their togetherness. Sometimes it was nice to forget all the difficulties that lay ahead, and just bask in the joy.


	10. Worst Case Scenario

Worst-Case Scenario

Round and full like the moon, her belly was swollen, and as the Doctor often jokingly remarked, 'full to capacity.' She would be delivering soon, only two weeks to go, by her grandmother's estimations. River Song was past the nervousness; she was ready to have her baby and hold it in her arms. Even the prospect of all the pain she would have to endure was no longer truly daunting, because of the relief it would bring. She had been carrying this baby for ten months, nearly a year. Things had happened at odd times; morning sickness not only occurred really late, it happened twice. Development was slower than usual for either species. Everything that a pregnant human had to face, she had to face, only at an unexpected time and often severely to boot.

Standing in the console room, one hand on her belly and the other on her lower back, she could feel it, suddenly. A pressure inside her, like a smaller version of those machines used to pry open old Earth automobiles. It hurt…and then all at once was gone.

She was in the hospital, stark and white. The Doctor held her hand as the hover-gurney sped down the hall. Doctors and nurses, masked and in pale green scrubs, ran along with the gurney. Her heart raced, but she was shaking. It was too soon. The baby wasn't due for another two weeks. Didn't her grandmother say that the baby wasn't quite ready?

"Mrs. Song, I need you to push now." His voice was so calm, so soothing. She felt sick. How had they gotten to the delivery room? She couldn't remember. There was pressure there, like she ought to push, and she tried. The Doctor stood with her. His face was white as a sheet, brown eyes wide and panicked.

"What is it, Doctor? What aren't you telling me?"

It hurt! It hurt it hurt it hurt it hurt it hurt it hurt it hurt. She was pushing pushing pushing screaming and his face was white like a sheet, eyes wide and dark and old.

"What's wrong, Doctor? What's wrong? What aren't you telling me?"

It hurt and it hurt and it didn't hurt anymore and it was quiet and his face was white and it was quiet so quiet, but there were lights flashing and his lips were moving and she couldn't hear the sound and there ought to be sound, oughtn't there?

"Mrs. Song." It was a doctor and he wasn't wearing a mask anymore, he was holding a bundle in his arms and the Doctor was there and his face was the color of milk and he was crying. Why was he crying? They had a baby now.

"Mrs. Song." The doctor offered her the bundle but it was wrong somehow, all wrong. The blanket was wet at the bottom, dark and wet. Dripping red onto the floor. Dripping red.

No.

No, it couldn't be.

And the bundle was red and dripping and the Doctor was white as milk and crying crying crying and she could hear her own voice whispering denials as the doctor with the bundle was holding it and it was dripping dripping dripping and he was sorry mrs. song so sorry but the baby the baby the baby was dripping dripping dripping red and where was her baby? This wasn't right wasn't right wasn't right and she was crying now, sobbing, feeling the hot tears run down her cheeks, fall onto her chest and her empty empty empty belly.

"NO!"

She was screaming screaming screaming as the bundle dripped red and the Doctor was white as milk and crying and all she could hear was the dripping of red of the bundle and her baby was dead dead dead and never coming back and dripping red dripping dripping dripping.

No.

No.

No.

No.

No.

Gasping, River Song sat bolt upright in bed. Shuddering and white as a sheet, she covered her face with her cold hands and began to sob.

The Doctor sat up almost immediately and wrapped her in his warm arms.

"River, what is it? What's wrong?"

"The baby, Doctor, the baby." She turned into his chest and sobbed. He rubbed warm circles on her back

"Shhhh now, it's all right. Only a dream."

She turned her tearstained face upwards to face him. Her eyes were fearful, red-rimmed and teary.

"I dreamed that she died, Doctor. The doctor had her in a bundle and it was dripping blood and she was—" she couldn't finish the sentence because she was sobbing again.

"Only a dream, River. It's all right now. Nothing's going to happen to our baby."

Her face was white.

"How can you be so sure?"

Smoothing her tangled curls with one hand, he kissed her forehead and held her close.

"Because I would never let anything happen to our child, all right? Nothing. This will be the safest child in the entirety of time and space, all right?"

She nodded, eyes still teary, and let him guide her back down onto the mattress of his bed. In the circle of his arms, she slowly drifted back off to sleep. This time, she did not dream.


	11. Developmental Differences

Developmental Differences

Up until the point of her second bout of morning sickness, River Song's pregnancy ran on the normal side for humans. This didn't astonish her. Many animal fetuses, though radically different in DNA, appeared similar to human fetuses of the same age. They weren't the same of course, that was an absurd notion, but in appearance, they looked very much alike. In the same way, her Time Lord baby developed in a way identical to that of human children up until the point that it really hit her that she was having an alien child.

Her head was hung over the toilet. The tea her grandparents had given her was effective for nearly every day, but every once in a while she didn't drink it for one reason or another and the nausea came back. This was one of those times.

"River, I'm being extraordinarily clever in here with the fixing things and all that, and you're nowhere to be—oh." Stopping mid-rant, the Doctor hurried into the bathroom and pulled her hair away from her face as she finished throwing up the remainders of her toast and jam.

"Did you have your tea?" It was astonishing how quickly he could go from childish to responsible.

"Not this morning, I was working on something and I suppose I forgot."

"Then we'll have to fix some. Are you finished?" He asked kindly and she nodded before dry-heaving into the toilet.

"I blame you entirely—f" she paused to heave again "—for this."

He half-smiled, massaging her shoulders one at a time, one-handed as the other hand was holding her hair.

"Is that so?"

"Yes. If you could just keep your big Time Lord trousers on, I'd be adventuring and enjoying real food!"

"Oh lovely River Song," He purred at her, "I think if you remember correctly, you often had a hand or two in removing my big Time Lord trousers."

"Shut up," she snapped, pausing again as her stomach tried to reject its lack of contents.

He fished around in one pocket for a rubber band and tied her hair back, then used both hands to rub the knots out of her shoulders and back. She got snappish when she was sick; he had learned that the hard way. Learning when to shut up was a new concept for him, but he learned fairly quickly. He didn't like it when River was unhappy, and not just because that meant less kisses—though admittedly that _was_ a factor.

"I don't want to leave you, love, but I want to put your tea on so you can feel better, all right? I'll use the automatic kettle. Be back before you know it."

She nodded, resting her forehead against the cool porcelain bowl. After the first morning sickness set, she had become extremely particular about keeping the toilets impeccably clean. As she rid herself of most of her breakfast, she was overwhelmingly glad that her mild obsession had paid off. It smelled like lemons and cleaner, rather than like nasty old toilet, and the very fact that it didn't smell made her experiences there all the less uncomfortable. There is nothing quite as bad as throwing up in a toilet that smells awful.

After the Doctor had left the room, River felt a little odd. Sitting up a little, she tried to pinpoint what it was. Her nausea was still intense, so it wasn't anything to do with that, but there was something _off_. Inside her skull there was a tingling sensation that she couldn't quite feel, like a ringing in her ears, only she couldn't hear anything. Wrinkling her forehead in thought, River wondered if this was another one of those pregnancy things, like morning sickness. Her nausea flared and she held her head over the toilet, feeling quite miserable; between the weight gain, the fact that her chest was sore, and she had to pee constantly, she really wasn't feeling charitable towards the Doctor at all. She loved him, she reminded herself, but at the moment, recalling their newlywed romps didn't bring back the fond smile it had in the weeks previous. It just made her want to hit him. Preferably in the nether regions.

"Tea's on the kettle, it'll scream when it's ready." He swung into the bathroom in a mildly frantic way and she wanted to knock him in the shins, but didn't. Her mantra for the past three days of vomiting had been _remember_ _you love him, remember you love him, remember you love him. _It had kept her from exploding at him so far, and when he did sweet things like rub her shoulders or fetch whatever bizarre food she was craving (and could eat, provided she had her tea) she didn't feel like hitting him. At least until she felt like throwing up again.

During the second fortnight-long bout of morning sickness, the Doctor learned his own mantra: _Yes, love_. The couple's respective mantras got them through the days, and when her morning sickness was finished, they both breathed a sigh of relief. Unfortunately, that's when the developmental differences became apparent, and quite startling.

XXXXXXXXXXXXXX

"Sweetie, you've met these people before, haven't you?"

They were running for their lives through what was supposed to be a nice tour of a rather spectacular Scottish castle. They were met with hostile forces, namely a set of knights and angry village people.

"Not yet, I haven't."

"Well they've clearly met you."

"How can you tell?"

"Not everyone finds you as charming as I do," she said dryly, chuckling as they ran. It was invigorating to run; she had forgotten how much she loved it. The danger she loved as well, but because of the baby, she wanted to avoid that.

"And sexy," the Doctor added helpfully, "Don't forget sexy."

"Yes, sweetie; _however_ could I forget." She shot him a sultry grin as they rounded a corner and began dashing up a flight of stairs. Shaking her head to stop the odd not-ringing in her mind, she blinked away the sensation that she had dealt with for going-on three weeks and continued bounding up the stairs, two at a time.

"So," he called to her, grinning that obnoxiously confident grin, "Come here often?"

"I bet you use that line on all the girls."

"Only the really good-looking ones."

"Oh stop it, you'll make me blush."

"I'll make you do a lot more than blush, love."

She laughed and wagged a finger at him.

"You naughty boy."

"You love it."

"Hush, sweetie. I'm busy."

"Oh sorry, do I have to be penciled in now? Your own husband?" He was laughing and the next time he looked to make a comment, she wasn't there.

"River?"

Lying sprawled across the stairs, her eyes were closed and she was limp, barely breathing.

"River?"

Dashing back down, he scooped her up and ran to the Tardis. As he ran he imagined the things she would be saying if she were conscious; the sorts of flirtatious or protesting comments she would make to being carried.

_Come on, love. You'll be all right. You've got to be all right._

XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX

In the Tardis, he ran every scan and test he knew, and nothing came up at all, except the pregnancy test of course. _That_ test came back as a resounding positive. He was inserting a needle into her arm to draw blood and had just begun extracting it when River's eyelids flickered and she made a soft little noise, almost a moan. He filled to vials with blood and removed the needle, bandaging the inside of her arm. Carefully, he placed a vial of the blood in a little machine and the other vial in a tiny storage container. The needle went into a bin and he rushed back to his wife, smoothing the hair back from her forehead. She blinked and forced her eyes open.

"Hey, love. How do you feel?"

She smiled at him warmly, and then her face took on a look of anxious confusion.

"Doctor, how did I get here?"

"You fell on the stairs."

"But how did I get _here_?"

"I carried you! I wasn't going to leave you there," he protested.

"All the way up those stairs?"

"Yes!" He said indignantly, his masculine pride a little bruised.

She patted his cheek affectionately.

"You're my big, strong hero now, is that it?"

He smiled a little, beginning to perk up, "Well I wouldn't say _hero_…"

She grinned back. "Good, neither would I."

He shot her a dirty look and the machine beeped. "This isn't over, River."

"Oh don't be cross. I liked you enough to marry you, didn't I?"

He smiled, "You _were_ sober when I proposed."

She made a face at him as he pulled her blood work from the machine, eyes flickering over the papers with growing confusion.

"Doctor, what is it?" Her voice took on a note of anxiety. "Is it the baby? Is she all right?"

He scanned over the papers, saying nothing. "Where's that book on Time Lord fetal development?"

"It's on the table next to the green couch in the library, on top of the baby journal and the human fetal development book."

"I'll be right back."

"Doctor, is the baby okay?" She was getting more aggressive and as her husband rushed from the room, she put a hand on her belly, now beginning to curve as she gained pregnancy pounds. She didn't know that she had a little glow about her face; no one had told her. It was just a little curve, and as she sat there, rubbing the little curved part of her stomach, she realized that the odd not-ringing that had plagued her was gone. Her husband dashed back in, flipping frantically through the Time Lord fetal development book.

"Doctor." Her voice was rock-hard and aggressive.

"In a moment, River."

"Not in a moment, now. Is there something wrong with our child?"

"I'm working that out as we speak. I need you to sit still for a second." He flipped a switch and there was a faint humming as a three-dimensional image of her brain appeared on a screen on the wall. Various areas lit up and numbers scrolled up one side of the screen. The Doctor studied the numbers, then the book, then the picture of River's brain.

"River, have you been hearing anything recently? Voices or anything?"

"I've had this weird feeling inside my head. Like ringing in my ears…but without sound. It's hard to explain."

Relief swamped over his features. He smiled at her, then gave her a hug.

"The baby's fine?" She asked anxiously.

"Yes, the baby is wonderful. I keep forgetting that you're _human_…or human-ish anyhow."

"And what's that got to do with anything?"

"That's got to do with _everything_, River. See, Time Lords are brilliant; I'm a prime example of that." River snorted and rolled her eyes, which he ignored. "We've got more complex brains than humans and we've got a lot of extra equipment up here." He tapped his skull for emphasis. "And one of those extra bits that humans don't have is a lobe in our brains that allows for telepathic communication with our Tardises. We've got telepathic bits in our brains and the baby's was developing or is developing. In a Time Lord mother, this wouldn't be a problem because we've learned to filter out telepathic white noise but you've never needed to learn that. And the baby was broadcasting all sorts of white noise as the lobe was being made and activated. From the look of it, the baby was testing out its telepathy, just like it'll test out its fingers and arms and toes. Only you're really really close and it gave you a blast that overwhelmed your brain and put you out like a light." He eyed River's stomach tentatively and she smiled, took his hand, and guided it to her belly.

It hadn't really clicked for him until that moment that a fully independent genetic being was currently taking up residence inside his wife. As his hand rested on her belly, she could feel a buzzing in her brain again.

"Oh no, it's all right, lovely. She's just not used to it, but I'll take care of it, all right?"

"You're talking to her?"

"What makes you so sure it's a her?"

"I just think it is, all right? Now, are you talking to her?"

"In the same way that you would talk to a baby. She doesn't understand what I'm saying, but I can _feel_ her tiny little mind buzzing away…its really odd."

"Yeah, imagine having that, only inside you."

"Well I can take care of that somewhat; I can shield your mind so when the baby tries out her telepathic lobes again, you won't be knocked unconscious again."

"How?"

"If there's anything you don't want me to see, just imagine a door closing, all right? And I won't see it."

Smiling, he put his hands on her temples and stared into her eyes, focusing. It was strange and alien and intimate. She could feel him there, inside of her mind, a faint sort of rustling, like the pages of a book being sped through, as one would do with a moving-pictures book. It was really very strange and when he said,

"Done," beginning to take his hands from her head, she put her hands over his and held them on.

"Wait," she said softly, and she stared back at him, but didn't see him, because she was finding a memory; a very special, very important memory.

She found it. Smiling gently, she remembered.

She remembered the discovery that she was pregnant, the joy and the uncertainty. She remembered the look on his face when she told him. She remembered him taking her hand on various occasions, remembered them looking at the picture of their baby together. When she was finished, she closed her eyes, still holding his hands on her head, just to feel his touch.

_I love you. So. Much_.

He smiled and rested his forehead on hers.

_And I, you. River Song. My River Song. Mother of my child._

_ Of __**our**__ child._

They sat there for a few moments, smiling, and then he handed her the baby diary.

"I suppose that this should go in the diary?"

"I suppose it should."

He handed her a pen and the books, then scooped her up, bridal-style and carried her back into the library. She laughed, a gorgeous, happy laugh, and kicked her legs playfully.

"Help! I've been kidnapped by a devastatingly handsome alien and he's come to have his way with me!"

He laughed as well, planting a chaste kiss on her lips before he set her down on the couch and sat next to her.

"I think it's a bit late for having my way with you, love. Way's already been had."

"You could have your way with me again…" She smiled at him playfully and he kissed her forehead.

"Mmm, that I could."

They both knew that she was only teasing; she was tired and a little stressed from having her mind overwhelmed. So they sat on the couch together as she recorded the baby's development. After she set down the little diary, she laid her head in his lap and he opened a book of Gallifreyan poetry and began to read. She dozed in his lap and after a while, he too fell asleep, settled next to River Song.


	12. Family Adventures

Family Adventures

Weeks seemed to pass in a rush. River gained weight and her belly grew more and more curved, along with her chest. She and the Doctor took to ending each week by reading bits of the Time Lord and the human fetal development books and trying to guess what their strange little baby had developed that particular week. River continued insisting that it was a girl, while the Doctor continued insisting that there was no way that she could know. She was prone to minor nosebleeds and headaches, just little things. And she was always hungry, not to mention her back seemed to ache more often now, especially in the evenings.

"I feel huge," she moped to her husband.

"You don't look huge," he said helpfully, running a hand over her belly. "You look gorgeous."

"I don't _feel_ gorgeous," she moaned, flopping onto his chair in the console room. Her nose trickled a little blood from her left nostril and she drew a tissue from her pocket and held it to her face, still sulking. The Doctor sat next to her, kneading her lower back with his nimble fingers. She re-pocketed the bloody tissue.

"You're absolutely lovely," he reassured his wife. With a sideways glance at her, he ran a gentle finger over her left breast, smiling as she started and looked at him. "And I very much like this addition to you."

"They've always been there, love."

"Yes, but now there's _more_ of them." His tone indicated that the addition pleased him.

She sighed, somewhat placated, and rested her head on his shoulder.

"You're such a wonderful man, you know that? You put up with me ever-so-well."

"Well I'd say it's even, considering that you put up with all this," he gestured to himself.

"True; you _are_ a handful."

"Oh at least a handful," he agreed, nodding. "I'd say I'm an armful, maybe a jail-full."

"We do have the handcuffs for that," she smiled and he smiled back, glad that she had been distracted from her moping.

"What do you say we go on an adventure?"

River smiled.

"That sounds nice."

"Somewhere nice, somewhere without a lot of shooting, somewhere interesting…ah I've got just the place! And the baby'll like it too!"

"How can you possibly know that?" She asked, amused.

He stuck his tongue out at her playfully,

"Spoilers."

"You haven't _met_ our child, Doctor."

"Well…spoilers for three minutes from now."

"You don't know what's going to happen."

"Sure I do."

"You're using 'spoilers' wrong. I might have to revoke your privileges to the word."

"You can't revoke privileges to a _word_, River."

"You'll find that I can do a lot of things you didn't know I could, Doctor."

"Oh can you?"

"I can."

"Would you like to demonstrate, Doctor Song?"

"Well maybe I would."

"Well maybe I'd like to see that."

She flashed him a playful grin,

"Maybe once you've grown up a bit."

Dancing around the console, piloting his Tardis, he stuck his tongue out at her.

"I am grown-up. I'm over nine centuries old. I pilot a borrowed antique ship, I've saved dozens of worlds, I have an impeccable sense of cool, I've made love to the most gorgeous woman in the universe, and I'm a father. How much more growing up can I do, Doctor Song? I could be your great great great great great great…" he paused to count on his fingers, before shaking his head, deciding not to do the math. "I could be your ancestor."

"And look at you, you naughty man. Preying on innocent young things like me."

"Oh River Song; lovely, brilliant, _gorgeous_ River Song. You are _anything_ but innocent," he purred.

"Is that so?"

"Yes, it most certainly is."

She looped a finger through one of his braces as he dashed by and stood, pausing for a moment as a quick dizzy spell slipped over her, and then vanished. Smiling at her with a face that certainly didn't _look_ over nine-hundred years old, he turned his head to one side.

"Yes, dear?"

"Shut up," she ordered affectionately, and kissed him. He smiled against her mouth and they kissed for a little while before he pulled away and asked,

"Would you like to see where I took us?"

She smiled and gave him another quick kiss, slipping her teasing tongue into his mouth for only a moment before she broke away and rushed to the Tardis doors, throwing them open.

It was a strange place they were landed. The closest thing that River could compare it to was the underside of a grape trellis. Overhead, a canopy of vines, suspended from trees, let in only dappled, green sunlight. From the vines hung objects resembling upside-down wine glasses, hollow in the middle with a bell-shaped body, suspended from a flexible green stem. They dangled everywhere and River examined one, hesitant to touch it.

"Where are we?"

"Oh, it's ever so much more fun if you guess."

"But then you can't tell me how clever you are."

He wrinkled his forehead momentarily, "That's true…"

"And since I won't know anyway, why don't you just tell me?"

He nodded slowly and then grinned at her cheekily.

"Nope! You've gotta guess!"

Pouting at him, she indicated one of the dangling bell-things. "Are those safe?"

"Yup!" He nodded with serene confidence, not the blustering assertiveness he used when he wasn't actually sure. Reaching out, she touched one. It began to sing.

Startled, she looked back at the Doctor, who smiled in a self-satisfied way.

"It sounds like a wine glass…or a bell…or a flute…like all of them at once, but not quite like any of them at all."

"Yup!"

She touched another and the fading ring of one of the glass-bell-things began to die, the one she had just touched started a new song in a different note. Fascinated, she looked at the different colors and began testing each one.

"Each of the colors is a different note!" She exclaimed, thoroughly entranced, "And the size and shape will make the note sharp or flat!"

He grinned, delighted at her entertainment.

"Have you guessed yet?"

"You know that I don't know," she told him tartly.

"Oh…guess anyway?"

"How about I do this instead?" Casually, she drew gentle circles with her fingernails at the nape of his neck, gently scratched his head, her fingers sliding effortlessly through his hair. He closed his eyes and smiled, humming a little in the back of his throat.

"That feels lovely," he remarked in a voice warm and smooth, like butterscotch.

"I know," she replied. "Where are we?"

"You're an awfully naughty woman you know," he told her, his voice sounding pleasantly drowsy.

"I know," she repeated, and stopped the lovely petting of his head.

"We're in the singing groves of the planet Abestia. Famous from all over; the Abestians learn to play the groves because once you pick one of the singers, as they're called, it won't make music anymore. Wonderful food source then, and really the entire economy and culture of this planet depends on the singing groves. But it's all right because no two concerts are alike because every year the plants are a little different. The people are a little different. Everything is ever-changing, just like the universe, and the music here reflects that. It's why Abestia is so popular."

"Then where is everyone?"

"Oh they're somewhere; I got us the VIP spot. Now did your man deliver or what?" He leaned against the Tardis in a very pleased way and she smiled at him, half-affectionate, half-exasperated.

"My man delivered, happy? Now you've got one more thing to explain. Why is the baby going to like this?"

"Because it can _hear_, River. And we read that it likes your voice very much as well as being able to hear other sounds. And the singers are a bit telepathic, so that'll stimulate the little tyke's brain. If you like, I can open your mind so you can hear it too."

"Maybe we can come back when she's born," River said wistfully. "I don't want another telepathic headache; I get enough _normal_ headaches from your child."

"Oh it's only _my_ child when it causes trouble."

"Well she got it from _your_ genes, mister."

"You can't inherit genes for _trouble_, River. I thought you were a scientist."

"And I thought that you were a nice enough, mildly mad man who happened to think his artifact blue box was a spaceship. So we've both been in the wrong." She smirked as she said it.

"I should be able to keep you from having a telepathic headache, love. I am clever, if I do say so myself."

"Says the man who struggles to find his pants in the morning," she deadpanned.

"Says the woman who couldn't make scrambled eggs if her life depended on it," he returned.

"Says the man who didn't notice that I'd taken his sonic screwdriver." She waggled the aforementioned object in the air.

Pulling her to him with an air of amused affection, he wrapped his arms around her waist and rested his chin on her hair, her back resting against his chest. In her mind there was a flicker, there was a soft humming, and then a soft chorus of song, like an alien orchestra.

"Is that—?"

"The singers? Yes."

He walked the pair of them, his chin on her hair, his chest pressing against her back, to a cluster of singer-fruits and began gently running a finger over different ones, creating chords and melodies of glorious song. As he tickled a counter-melody on the singers that she could hear in her ears and her mind, he began to sing, softly, gently.

_Listen now, you children_

_ Blessed, shining ones_

_ Of the burnt-orange sky_

_ Of the flaming silver trees_

_ Of the ruby fields and silent mountains_

_ Sing, children! Sing of Gallifrey!_

_ Sing of our shining world!_

_ Sing of our home._

His tone was gentle, loving. He sang in Gallifreyan, using words she did not entirely understand. And standing there, he played their child a Gallifreyan lullaby. Inside of her, she could feel a strange sort of tickle, and a similar one in her mind. Gasping, she seized his hand and placed it on her temple. As he sang their baby her first lullaby, she helped him to feel the very first movements that she had experienced within her. She shared the movement in her belly, the tentative brushes at her mind. And as he sang, for once it seemed that nothing in the universe was out of place. They were exactly where they ought to be.


	13. Twenty Weeks

The Twenty-Week Checkup

Cuddled and warm under the covers, River left her eyes closed when she felt the gentle brush of lips on her neck. His arms were already around her and his body was pressed against hers, his double-heartbeat gently drumming into her back. Softly, he trailed gentle kisses up the top of her spine and onto her neck, gently sucking a little spot just below her ear.

"Doctor," she mumbled sleepily, rolling to face him. He moved a little, accommodating her belly by curling around it and scooting up to meet her lips. His hands were beginning to wander with familiar eagerness. Gently, she took hold of his wandering hands, his caressing fingertips, and led them to her belly, resting them away from all the places they had been drifting to.

"Sorry sweetie; I know what you want but I'm really not in the mood right now."

He sighed a little, but nodded.

"I'm sorry, honey. But we're going to see my grandmother again for the checkup today and between that and the fact that my back is killing me, I just don't think I'm up for it. Maybe tomorrow, all right?"

He cuddled against her the best that he could.

"You don't have to defend yourself to me, love. It's all right."

Smiling, she cuddled closer to him and thought of the weeks that lead up to the point they were at.

She didn't take any medicines for the headaches and backaches that plague her more and more often. She relied on the Doctor's hands to work out the soreness and warm baths, naps, and tea for the headaches. Sometimes they worked, sometimes they didn't. He was more supportive than she imagined he would be. Who knew that pregnancy would teach her ridiculous, insane Doctor to grow up? She knew that he had been a father before, but it was so long ago.

They argued more. Generally playful, flirting banter, but as her hormone levels began their rollercoaster-ride, she snapped at him more often. He occasionally got short with her for being unreasonable. Shouting matches generally ended in them laying together on a couch or his bed eating jammie dodgers and muttering apologies before switching the conversation to High Gallifreyan. She got so much better at his language during this point that she began to read some of the novels he had in Gallifreyan, only occasionally asking what a word meant. They spent an increasing amount of time just lying together, enjoying being alone. The Tardis created a new room which River stumbled upon the week previous. Inside the pastel green and yellow walls, it contained a crib, changing table, rocking chair, and dresser. River smiled and didn't mention it to the Doctor, who despite his interest in how their baby was developing, seemed to grow anxious when the actual baby was mentioned in the context of no longer being inside of River.

"We should probably get up," she murmured into his ear and he smiled, sighing.

"It is a time machine…we could stay in bed all morning if we wanted to."

It was a tempting thought, just lying there in his arms, cuddled close and safe and loved. However, her stomach rumbled and she sighed.

"Looks like baby's hungry, and I don't trust you to cook again. That omelet was unrecognizable."

"I wouldn't say unrecognizable…"

"I would. Come on, we've got a big day ahead of us. It's the day I'm being proven right."

"I'd actually rather not know if it's all the same to you."

They had only briefly discussed whether or not they were going to ask about the sex of the child, and the conversation had been inconclusive. River realized that she didn't want to have one of them know and the other not know. And despite the fact that she really wanted to know whether or not the baby was a girl, as she suspected, she wanted this to be something that they could share as an experience.

"This is just so you can gloat, isn't it?"

"Maybe. I have a fifty-fifty chance of being right, you know."

"Well tell you what. If you don't want to know, I won't ask either. I'd be rubbish at keeping it from you."

"Liar; you seem to do all right with your spoilers."

"And I want this to be something we share."

She rolled over and got to her feet, muttering grouchily as she rubbed her back and put on a dressing gown. The Tardis rearranged the rooms for her so everything was a shorter walk. The Doctor found this amusing, only it only did the same for him if she was also there.

"The old girl likes me," River said, shrugging. "And she only does it on the days that my back really hurts."

The Doctor grouched anyway, despite the fact that he got to his toast five minutes before he usually would.

XXXXXXXXXXXXXX

They arrived in the backyard in a rush and River's grandmother peered out the back door and smiled, bellowing back into the house,

"You were right! Happy?"

Laughter rang out from inside the house and her grandfather appeared in the doorway.

"Hello River," he greeted her as they met in the center of the lawn. After a series of hugs, her grandmother looked her up and down.

"How many weeks are you? I saw you for the first time….oh last year. And you delivered three or four months ago."

"Is the baby all right?" River asked in a rush, and her grandmother made a zipping motion above her lips.

"That mad husband of yours already explained that we're not to tell you anything. Have you got the data-drive? We've got some scans and tests to do. Oh, and the two of you are staying for the weekend. Did anyone mention that to you?

The Doctor opened his mouth to protest and Sophie held a hand up to his face,

"You don't do domestic. I know. Well you've got a baby on the way so it seems that you can manage a weekend with your family. Have you brought your toothbrushes?"

Tom chuckled as the Doctor sagged in defeat. The older woman had the same resolve as her granddaughter or was it the other way round? Either way, it was useless to argue.

"Excellent," Sophie said with a warm smile. "Now let's all go inside and have a bite to eat. You're much too skinny and you're going to set an example for my future grandchild.

Tom emerged from the living room with a basket covered with a blanket. Underneath the basket were the unmistakable shapes of toys.

"You brought the baby over a few days ago. We hadn't picked up the toys yet." After this brief explanation, he carried the basket away to some other part of the house. River could see the Doctor's mind picking out all the shapes of the toys, trying to guess what was under the blanket. She smacked his arm.

"Sweetie, no. Spoilers."

Rolling his eyes, he waltzed into the kitchen where there was food sitting on the counter in the open.

"I don't know how you manage to do it, but whenever we arrive you're both here and there's food waiting."

"We're very good," Sophie said with a smile, and the Doctor eyed her suspiciously, but was quickly distracted by the presence of a cherry pie and a plate full of sandwiches.

"Have you got ham salad in here? I love ham salad." He picked one of the sandwiches apart, which got his hand smacked lightly with a spoon.

"Don't play with your food," Sophie ordered, cutting him a slice of pie. "The ham salad ones are on wheat bread. The white bread has chicken salad."

Pouting a little, the Doctor selected several sandwich triangles and put them on his plate next to the pie.

"Raspberry fizz for the Doctor and peach juice for River?" Tom asked, already pouring the aforementioned drinks into glasses for them.

"Thanks grandpa."

The Doctor was staring at his raspberry fizz with a mixture of awe and confusion.

"How did you—" he began, but Tom merely smiled. "I'm clever," he remarked, and helped himself to a sandwich. After giving the raspberry fizz a tentative taste, he enthusiastically downed the glass in several gulps.  
>"You really don't want to do that…" River began, but the Doctor had already finished the glass. It took all of eight seconds for his stomach to begin making weird noises. Fascinated, he looked down at his middle.<p>

"Is this what pregnancy is like?"

River was laughing so hard that she nearly missed the Doctor lurching forward to nearly vomit into the garbage can next to the counter. He caught himself and raised a finger, his face a little green.

"Do you have an antacid or something?"

River sighed and fetched a bottle of antacid tablets from the medicine cabinet and dropped them into her husband's hand.

"You've never had raspberry fizz before, have you?"

"Of course I've had raspberry soda before, River."

"That's not what I asked. I asked if you had ever drunk raspberry fizz."

"Not specifically raspberry fizz, no."

"If you don't dilute it," she shot her grandfather a glare, which he calmly ignored, "and drink it too quickly, the fizz upsets your stomach and you throw up. Or in your case, nearly throw up."

"And it's still on the market?"

"It's a fantastic drink _if you dilute it_," she said, directing the meaningful tone at her grandfather, who shrugged. "He always has raspberry fizz undiluted."

"Well from now on, he doesn't. Or he drinks it _slower_," the latter part of the statement was directed at her husband, who was still looking mildly green. He nodded, looking rather sick.

"Why don't you go lay down in our room, all right? Grandpa, which room are we staying in?"

"The one you and your cousin Lori always stayed in."

River's expression grew dour. "Very mature, Grandpa."

The Doctor looked at her and stage-whispered, "Have I done something wrong?"

"Not yet you haven't," Tom muttered.

"Wonderful," he remarked grouchily. River led him to their room, still scowling and muttering about not being a little girl anymore.

Once they got to the room, the Doctor understood why River was unhappy with the set-up. In the room were two beds, both meant for one person. They were in opposite corners of the room and all the furniture separated them. River and Lori had never really gotten along as children, but they had been forced to share a room because the room was the one of the few furnished for children. The Doctor lay down on the bed closest to the door, curling up on his side, knees to his stomach. River sat on the bed next to him, running her fingers through his hair, massaging his skull. His eyes closed,

"That feels lovely," he murmured, still sounding rather sick.

She smiled and continued her stroking.

"I'm sorry my grandfather did that to you. I really don't know what's gotten into him."

"It's entirely possible that I do drink it undiluted, love. I wouldn't want to ruin the flavor and now I know not to gulp it down. It's really not his fault."

"But he put us in this room instead of one of the ones with a bed for two people."

"To be fair, he did say that I haven't done it yet. It's entirely possible that I did something rude the last time they saw me."

"Grandma was fine."

"Sophie went straight to the lab with our data-drive. You don't know if she's angry at me or not."

"Doctor," she began, but he reached out and took her hand.

"Let's not fight, all right? I already feel awful."

River silently gained another measure of respect for his self-control. He _hated_ being sick. Especially because he was very rarely sick, so the idea of being in bed all day both bored and frustrated him. The fact that he had the self-control to realize that he was unhappy because he was feeling ill and not to redirect it spoke measures about him in River's book; her metaphorical book and later in the little blue diary where she noted their adventures.

She continued petting his head for a while until he sat up slowly.

"I think I'm all right now; I don't really feel like—" And that was precisely when he threw up all over the rug.

River looked over at him.

"Better?"

Red-faced and uncomfortable, the Doctor nodded.

"Do you want a glass of water to rinse out your mouth?"

He nodded again.

"I'll go fetch one then. Just stay there, all right? I'll be right back with your water and the cleaner-bot."

**Special thanks to all of my readers who continue to keep me writing by putting up lovely reviews. You guys are the best!**


	14. Domestic Weekend

Domestic Weekend

River and the Doctor emerged from their room at her grandparents' house. He looked much better and she looked more annoyed than anything else. Doing her best to keep a civil tongue, she said to her grandfather,

"The Doctor and I are going downstairs to have grandma check up on our baby."

Tom nodded and resumed cleaning the kitchen, his expression serenely blank. River thought rude things about him as they descended into the basement laboratory and the Doctor shot her a concerned look, able to feel her discontent as her grip on his hand tightened.

"Grandma?" River called as they descended the stairs. Sophie smiled and waved at them from across the lab. "You wouldn't _believe_ what Grandpa's done."

"What has he done?" Sophie returned mildly, typing away on her computer, analyzing the data from their data drive. The Doctor turned to look at the screen, interested, and she flipped the moniker off, wagging a finger at him.

"You yourself told us not to let you see anything from your future. Now behave yourself."

Properly chastised, the Doctor turned towards River, whom had since released his hand and gone to stand by the scanner, her shirt already off in preparation for the full-body scan. After ensuring that Sophie wasn't looking, he allowed his gaze to wander every lovely inch of his wife. Her belly was full with his child and he privately wondered what the little tyke looked like. If it was a girl, as River insisted, he wondered if she would look like him or River. And if she did look like him, which him would she look like? Which regeneration's features would look back at him from her little face? And what if it was a boy? The questions remained the same.

As he tried to picture the little face, River continued undressing, recapturing his attention. It didn't seem fair that the universe had seen to grace him with such a beautiful creature (fair to everyone else that is.) Even now, carrying a child, she was beautiful, but in a different way. Her sexy, buxom figure had given way to a maternal roundness and a soft beauty that pleased his primal brain, assuring him that this woman was a good mate, a good mother for his offspring. Consciously, he realized that he liked her extra curves, though he would also be pleased when he could hold her without having to bend himself around her belly.

"He gave the Doctor raspberry fizz undiluted!"

"He always drinks it that way," Sophie said absently, adjusting a few dials.

The Doctor resisted the urge to say 'I told you so' and instead kept his expression blank. River, now naked and waiting, crossed her arms over her sore breasts, shivering in the chilly lab. The Doctor stood behind her and wrapped his arms around her, keeping her warm for a minute or so until Sophie said,

"All right, into the scanner with you."

"That's not all he did," River continued, putting her hands on her head, just like the time before.

"What else has he done?"

"He put us in my and Lori's old room!"

Sophie nodded, and hit a few buttons.

"Hold that thought, dear. Stay very still while we get a good look at that baby of yours. Do you want to know the sex?"

"No," the Doctor said quickly. "We want a surprise."

"If that's what you want," Sophie shrugged and after a few minutes, she switched off the scanner. "All right get dressed. Now what has your grandfather done?"

"He put us in the room Lori and I used to sleep in!" River's face was a little pink with frustration and she began dressing herself, one hand on her husband's shoulder for balance.

"Well to be fair, River, the Doctor was very rude to him yesterday." Sophie didn't appear to be paying very much attention at all. She was typing and processing the data from the scanner, incorporating it into the model she already had of River's pregnancy.

"We were with you yesterday?"

"Yes dear." Still typing, Sophie's answers sounded faint, absentminded.

"With the baby?"

"No, dear. As you are today. You came back for…oh damn it."

"What? Is the baby all right?" River asked anxiously.

"No; I'm not meant to tell you when I see you next. Drat I've done it again. Tom keeps telling me not to try and concentrate on doing two things at once but bless him, I never do listen."

River softened somewhat; she loved her grandparents dearly and the clear affection they had for each other made it difficult to stay angry.

"Can't you do something to get us into a room with one bed? The Doctor already threw up on the carpet and the cleaner-bot took care of it. I really can't see us doing much else that could get us out of there."

Sophie smiled,

"River, your grandfather will get over it. Unfortunately, he'll get over it faster if he feels that the Doctor has been properly punished. You know how protective he is that way."

Scowling, River nodded as she pulled her socks back on. Leaning down, she sighed grouchily.

"Honey, would you mind tying my shoes?"

"All thumbs now, are we Song?" he teased in Gallifreyan.

"Keep teasing me," she replied, still in Gallifreyan, "See how long you can manage not sharing a bed once we get back to the Tardis."

"Someone's testy today," he muttered, bending down to tie his wife's shoes for her. As he turned slightly to tie her other shoe, she patted his head.

"Thanks you, sweetie," she said, reverting back to a language her grandmother understood.

"Anything for you, honey," he grumbled, not really particularly grouchy, but feeling as though he ought to be a bit indignant. As he stood, she squeezed his bum, looking entirely innocent when he jumped and turned to look at her. Smiling a little now, he turned back to Sophie and her diagrams. The projector-screen was off, but her personal screen was on and after a few more moments, she looked up.

"All right, looks like the little one is doing well. The brain is looking normal for development and everything seems to be growing at the proper rate. I'm going to need a few samples to check hormone levels and all that, but otherwise, you're looking well. Would you like to see h—it?" Sophie asked, catching herself before she revealed the baby's gender.

Both parents crowded the screen as a two-minute-long loop of the scan showed their baby sucking its thumb, then stretching, and then making swimming motions. They watched it several times, enthralled by the little life that they had created. After the fourth loop, Sophie asked warmly if they wanted a copy of the loop. Both of them said yes at exactly the same time. Sophie, rolling her eyes in amusement, made a copy on a little disk, placed it in a case, and handed it to River, who handed it to the Doctor, who stuck it in his pocket.

River had blood drawn and urine samples taken. After her prick was bandaged and Sophie took the samples for testing, she shooed the couple upstairs.

"Go for a walk or play a game with your grandfather."

"Grandma, I'm not exactly pleased with my grandfather right now."

"All the more reason to play a game with him; it'll get him back in your good graces. Why don't you get out the Chinese Checker set? You can all play. Or the antique Monopoly board that you both are so fond of. No cards though, I promised him we could wait to play poker until after dinner."

"Poker?" the Doctor asked, delighted.

River laughed, "You're excited about it now. Wait until you owe them your life savings. Then we'll see who's pleased about playing poker."

Sophie laughed and shook her head, "We'll play with chips, love. Or pennies. Or biscuits."

The Doctor brightened, "Sounds like fun!"

Shaking her head, River climbed the stairs to the main floor of the house. Little did he know…poor man didn't stand a chance.

XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX

They pulled out the Chinese checkers board and River begrudgingly asked Tom if he wanted to play with them. Smiling serenely, he agreed, partially to River's displeasure. They chose their respective colors; River chose red, the Doctor selected blue, and Tom filled his palm with green pieces.

"Why do you have this game?" the Doctor asked, curious. "I like Chinese checkers, but it's _ancient_. Most people have holographic games and digital things. But you have old Earth games. Why is that?"

"Grandma likes authenticity," River replied. "She always used to say when I was a little girl that the world had enough artificiality already. So I ate vegetables from her garden and when I came over, we played cards and board games and watched old two-dimensional films. We read books. I played pretend. I had a very old-fashioned childhood."

"And you turned out well, so clearly we did something right," Tom remarked, as everyone set their pieces on the board.

"Yeah yeah," River muttered and Tom produced a coin. "Call it."

As the coin flipped into the air, she called,

"Heads!" while the Doctor grumbled, "Tails."

The coin landed face-up.

"I was calculating the number of rotations that it was making," the Doctor began, complaining.

"I know," River replied calmly, "You were cheating. So I called it first."

"Not cheating, River. I'm just using my brain instead of relying on luck."

"If the two of you are done arguing," Tom interjected, "River moves first."

River moved her marble and the Doctor appeared to be calculating before he moved his.

"You're going to be ridiculously competitive, aren't you?" the Doctor asked in Gallifreyan.

"I'm playing Chinese checkers with my husband and my grandfather," she replied indignantly.

"So…yes."

"Yes."

"I thought as much."

"That's not polite, River," Tom remarked as he moved his marble into place.

"What?"

"Speaking gobbledygook that others can't understand."

"You and Grandma did it all the time when I was little."

"That was Russian. And we had our reasons. Besides you learned it, so we had to switch again."

Biting her tongue, River moved another piece. They went around the board, moving pieces.

"Have you thought about what you're naming my grandchild?"

River exchanged glances with the Doctor before replying,

"It's not something we've really discussed too much; we don't know if we want to name the baby after someone or give it an entirely new name. And then there's choosing whether to give her a human name or a Gallifreyan name. We want to be able to honor both of our cultures."

Tom nodded as he moved a marble into place.

"That child will have to live h—its entire life with that name, so be careful what you decide to name it." Tom caught himself before he revealed his grandchild's gender.

"We haven't talked about it too seriously yet; we're still focusing on River," the Doctor said smoothly. Tom nodded his approval as River moved her piece.

Around and around the board they went until Tom, smiling triumphantly, dropped the final marble into its indent on the opposite side of the board.

"I win," he said calmly, and stood. "Now I suppose I had better start dinner."

Scowling, River put the game away as her grandfather disappeared into the kitchen.

"We're going for a walk!" She called towards the kitchen, and a hand slid into view and shooed them.

"Be back by seven," Tom called and the pair of them slipped out the front door and began to walk down the street.

"Wait," the Doctor said, and he scanned River with the sonic screwdriver, and then fiddled with it a bit. "All right, now if a younger version of you gets close by, the sonic'll beep and we'll know to avoid her. Don't want to cross timelines."

"What do you think she'll look like?"

"Like a younger version of you…" the Doctor replied, confused.

"No, honey. The baby."

"Oh! We don't know that it's a girl."

"I know."

"There's no way that you can know."

"I suppose we'll find out in a few months, won't we?"

"Yes, we will." After a moment, he looked at her, "I've been wondering as well. Will it look like you or me? And which regeneration of me will it look like?"

"I like this version of you," she replied, kissing his nose, "But if she looks like your last regeneration, then we'll have to watch out when she gets older."

"If it's a boy, we'll have to watch out as well. I was a looker."

"Confident, are we?"

"I was!" he protested.

"Still are," she replied, circling an arm around his waist. He puffed up a little and she chuckled. The sonic beeped and they turned to see a little girl with a mass of blonde, fluffy curls, speeding down the street on a hoverboard. Pulling her out of the street, the Doctor smiled down at his wife.

"You were quite the little wild child, weren't you?"

A group of girls on hoverboards sped after her, shouting angrily.

"What have you gotten yourself into, love?" He muttered.

"I _remember_ today!" she exclaimed. "I ran off with Remy Michelle's hoverboard because she broke mine!" After a moment, she started.

"I have to go after her…me…"

"What? No! I just said that we didn't want to cross timelines!"

"Well I don't remember you rescuing me, and there's no one else around! There was another woman who came to pull Remy Michelle off of me."

"Did she look like you?"

"No, she was older, like someone's mother. Brunette, but straight hair, but I don't see anyone around, do you?"

The Doctor pointed to a woman running down the street towards the children.

"Like her?"

"Yeah…"

The woman picked up the lead girl by her arm and lifted her bodily off of little River, who was red-faced and trying hard not to cry. Her arm was bent at a funny angle."

"That little girl _broke your arm_?"

"Nasty little thing, isn't she? Her family moved off-planet a couple years after this."

"Good riddance," the Doctor muttered, hugging his wife.

"Yeah."

The woman picked up the young River and rushed back to a house.

"What's she doing?" the Doctor asked.

"She took me to her house and called my parents. They couldn't be reached so she took me to the hospital and got me patched up. The doctors there were pretty familiar with me by then; I was always falling or cutting myself or something."

"So just as fearless as you are now?"

She smiled and gave him a peck on the cheek, "Come on; let me take you to the park I used to play at."

XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX

After a long walk, they returned to the house. River retrieved her baby journal out of the Tardis and they sat together on the couch as River recorded the developments of the day, and the tests that she was undergoing. She appeared to be roughly on schedule with both human and Time Lord development.

River took a short nap before supper while the Doctor opened a book from one of the shelves in the living room and read it, sitting on his bed, all the while listening to the soothing breathing of his sleeping wife. He himself had just began to doze when Tom's voice called,

"Dinner!"

After carefully setting down his book, the Doctor woke up River and the pair of them exited the bedroom and strolled into the dining room. Food was already set out and after everyone was seated and given drinks (no one had raspberry fizz), the meal began. Conversation was kept light and neutral and Sophie reported that all River's tests had come back and that she was perfectly healthy, as was their baby.

Conversation turned towards the baby and then away from it as Sophie told them that she didn't want to spoil anything for them that was yet to come. Instead, they swapped stories about childhood experiences. The Doctor's were interesting, but actually not as alien as expected. He spoke of climbing trees and sneaking out of the house to meet his friends, and occasionally of pulling jokes on the professors at his school.

"I was a little terror," he chuckled.

"And with my luck, the baby will be as well," River said with a long-suffering sort of smile. He grinned somewhat cheekily at her,

"Well you wouldn't want a _boring_ child, would you?"

Tom and Sophie laughed at this; "That child is anything but boring," Sophie remarked, then mimed zipping her lips.

"And that's all I'll say on that subject."

Dinner seemed to loosen up Tom's mild hostility for the Doctor and after the dishes were cleared and the dessert eaten, the table was wiped clean and a fresh deck of cards was set on the table, as well as a large box of chocolate digestive biscuits and an equally large box of jammie dodgers and a little bowl of crisps.

"River, love, split the biscuits up evenly between us all. Crisps are for munching on."

The Doctor looked excited and pleased and River couldn't help but smile. As she counted out the biscuits and the jammie dodgers, she muttered to him in Gallifreyan

"You have no idea what you're getting into, sweetie."

He chuckled, "I've beaten _geniuses_ at cards, love. Beethoven, for instance. I should be all right."

"You might have beaten Beethoven, but you've never played my grandfather."

Settling herself in for a long run, River put the biscuit boxes on the floor and watched the cards fly through Sophie's fingers as she dealt them. This was going to be interesting…


	15. Warp Star Blackjack

**Please Read First**

**(Blah blah blah BBC owns Doctor Who. I own Tom and Sophie and the baby.)**

**1) I have not yet seen 'A Good Man Goes to War' because I am American and it hasn't aired here yet. So no spoilers please and once I do see it, I'll mention it as a disclaimer or something. And then any new knowledge will be woven into the storyline, no doubt. **

**2) I learned about blackjack a bit on the internet. However, instead of trying to work out all the rules and such, I took the things I read, and used them to create this future-version of the game.**

**3) Thank you so much for the reviews and encouragement. If there's anything you'd particularly like to see or have any questions or comments, put it in the reviews or PM me. **

**Thanks! And on to the story!**

Warp Star Blackjack

Sophie dealt the cards. They flew through her fingers with rapidity and ease. She looked directly at the Doctor as she dealt and said in a very clear, non-accusatory tone.

"No alien tricks. Play on human level."

To the rest of the table, she said, "Usual Song-house rules. No splits, no doubles. Hit or hold. Keep or fold. Five jammie dodgers to a digestive biscuit."

A little stunned at her directness, the Doctor nodded, stacking his biscuits in little piles. He had played poker before and was familiar with the game. Warp-star blackjack was a twist on the old-Earth game, but had a lot of the essential basics. The object here was still to get as close to 21 as possible, but it was a little different. The rules were altered and the betting system was odd.

It was a little eerie though, even to him, how quickly that River's grandparents slipped on a calm mask, hiding all emotion. When he looked over at his wife, she had slipped on a similar expression. It was akin to being in a room with several androids. (River would have known better. She dated an android once and it was rubbish.)

After anteing a jammie dodger each into the center of the table, they picked up their cards and peered at them. The Doctor's eyes swept everyone's faces for the little tells that would give away whether their hand was good or not. River was gently thumbing the edge of her second card and he concealed a smile. She did that same thing when she was trying to figure out a problem. She was thumbing a low card. Pleased at what he had found out, he looked down at his own cards.

In his hand he held a queen of spades and a two of hearts. He looked up and waited. Sophie turned a bland face on her granddaughter, who nodded calmly. A card slid across the table and landed neatly in front of her fingers. She turned her gaze on him and he nodded as well. The card he was slid was a jack of diamonds. Damn. Bust. It wasn't over for him yet, though. In warp-star blackjack, you could still bet and bluff after the cards were sufficiently distributed.

Sophie went around the table. River stayed. Since he had already busted, he nodded, receiving another card. He could bluff them into thinking that he had a good hand. He allowed his lip to twitch, just barely, at the corner. Tom's brow was wrinkled, almost imperceptibly. He had a crap hand but didn't want to risk it. Sophie looked serene, her hand was probably average. River was still thumbing the card. She was in the same boat as Tom. Sophie pushed in another jammie dodger and River did the same, though she paused momentarily before doing it. It was so hard not to just allow himself to take advantage of his brain, or his telepathic capabilities, of his…Time-Lord-ness.

After they anted around the table, Sophie offered a last call for cards. Hesitating, River took another card. Her face remained blank, but her eyes sparkled a little, her neck flexed, just a tiny bit. She had a winning hand, he was sure of it. She anted in another jammie dodger. The Doctor, still hoping on getting by on bluffing, did the same, and raised her another jammie dodger.

Tom didn't appear to want to, but he met the raise as did Sophie. They went around the table twice more until Sophie gracefully folded and the rest of them stayed in.

"Cards," Sophie said calmly.

River turned up a cool nineteen, perfectly respectable. The Doctor, frowning, turned up his already-bust hand. At least he hadn't been beaten by Tom. Looking over expectantly at him, the Time Lord watched as his wife's grandfather lay down a perfect twenty one, his face never changing. Shooting the table a quick smile, he scooped up the pot and stacked his winnings in front of him. The Doctor's jaw drooped; all the physical signals had indicated that the old man held a low hand. He'd been bluffing with his body language? Slightly more cautious now, the Doctor anted in another jammie dodger and the next round began.

They played warp-star blackjack for about an hour and Tom cleaned out everyone else's pot. After that, they switched to playing seven-card stud, then five-card draw, and finally shocks. Shocks was a poker-style game that had originated in the late 30th century and had developed into being a retro, but still popular, game in River's time. The rules were complicated and penalties were given for breaking them. Thankfully, this was a game that the Doctor was certain he could beat River's grandfather at. The cards were dealt and they played.

XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX

As they brushed their teeth over the sink, the Doctor asked,

"How could he have beaten me at shocks? I'm the king of shocks!"

"I told you he was good."

"He won seventy-nine percent of all the games we played!"

"Really?" River paused to spit toothpaste into the sink and rinse out her mouth. "That's a tad low for him, he usually averages about eighty-six."

"How is that even possible?" It was odd for the Doctor to go to bed at the same time as everyone else. If River went to bed early, he'd usually just come in later, but with his other companions it didn't much matter when they went to bed. He slept less than the average human, about five hours was a good amount of time for him. If he was feeling particularly tired, he might get seven hours of sleep, but only if he was ill or had been injured or exhausted beyond belief. Since he liked holding River so much, he had taken to timing his bedtime so he would wake up approximately when she did. If he woke up first, he had ways of passing time. But this, getting into pajamas and brushing teeth and putting out the lights at the same time as everyone else, was odd. He looked over at River after he had finished cleaning his teeth.

"Do you mind if I read for a few hours? I'll read in the living room if you like."

"No, stay in here," River replied, "Just pull the curtain around your bed. Lori used to holo-message her friends late at night and the curtains blocked the light so I got a set on my bed as well."

"Am I sleeping in your bed, or Lori's?"

"Lori's; I'll just put the curtains around my bed as well to block out the extra light."

"All right. Goodnight, love." He kissed her forehead and she climbed into bed, drawing the curtains around her sleeping place.

It wasn't odd for her to go to bed before the Doctor or even without the Doctor, but she missed his bed, the way his smell lingered on the sheets. She missed the way the Tardis hummed around her as she slept. After reminding herself that it was only for two nights, she closed her eyes and slept. The Doctor opened his book and began to read. It was a good story, a biography of a famous explorer. Not as good as him, but who was? He smiled in the general direction of River, who would have laughed at his thought and called him cheeky.

After a few hours and several books, he was contemplating sleep, when he heard River's breath change, become quicker. It became uneven and she was muttering something, beginning to drop into a pleading tone. Nightmare. He knew that she had them on an infrequent basis, slightly more often now that she was pregnant, but that she had them. Standing, he slipped out from behind the curtain and made his way across the room. He pushed aside the curtain and carefully shook River. She did not wake upon the first attempt, so he shook her again, whispering soothing things in Gallifreyan. She woke with a start, eyes wide with fear and her heartbeat racing. As soon as she set eyes on the Doctor, she reached her arms out to him, like a child.

Carefully he slipped into bed next to her. It was really only meant for one person, but spooned together, her back to his chest, his face in her hair, they fit. One of his arms served as a pillow and the other wrapped around her waist. Shuddering, she calmed down and whispered to him the contents of her nightmare. It consisted of them running from something that was trying to kill them, as usual, and just when they had gotten back to the Tardis, the cradle had been empty and the monster had their baby. The creature was lifting the child, about to drop it from its enormous claws, when she had woken up.

"Didn't I tell you that I would never ever let anything happen to our baby?"

She nodded, "I know, Doctor. That's why they're only dreams."

"I love you."

Sighing, she snuggled against him. "I love you too, sweetie."

His double-heartbeat was a lullaby and she drifted off. He lay awake for another hour, and during them he felt his child moving within her, the little flutters underneath his fingers. While River slept, he touched the mind of the baby, singing it a telepathic lullaby. His mother had done the same for him while she was pregnant, or so she had told him. After a few songs, he too fell asleep.

XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX

He knew where he was as soon as he woke up, but it was nice, being this close to River, his whole body pressed gently against her, her breathing slowly pushing her back against his chest in a slow yet steady rhythm. It was nice to feel this close to another person. Not just physically, mind, but emotionally. It was nice that (except for a few spoilers) they knew nearly everything about each other. It was nice that they could sense each other's moods and react appropriately. It was nice that she didn't have to be taught how to respond to his exclamations of brilliance and that he didn't have to be guided into how to hold her in his arms. It was nice that neither one really had to tell the other how to love them. It had been learned and now here they were, together. Sighing, he settled himself against his wife, whose breathing hadn't altered in the slightest, but he knew that she was awake.

"Good morning, beautiful," he murmured, his lips brushing her ear. Smiling, she snuggled against him and held his arm in place across her middle.

"Did you sleep well?" He asked, his voice low and drowsy, content.

"Mmm-hmm; I always do when you're here."

The double-beat of his hearts was a soothing lullaby to her. There was no feeling more calming then feeling of his hearts beating against her, thrumming in her bones. His warmth seeping slowly into her skin made her feel safe and content. There was a soft tapping on the door,

"River? Doctor? Breakfast in an hour, loves." Sophie's voice came through the door, reminding River that they actually needed to get up today. Sighing, she made circles with her thumb on the Doctor's hand.

"Looks like we've got to get up; I for one need a shower."

He nodded, "I suppose you're right."

She turned her head so she could see him, "I could use some help scrubbing my back if you're interested."

Smiling, he stretched and slowly got out of bed. She did the same and collected the neat stack of towels on the shelf by the door. Tossing him one, she headed towards the bathroom, the door next to theirs. Yawning, she rolled her shoulders and walked into the bathroom, turning on the water. Her grandparents' water took a minute or two to warm up and she didn't want to step into an icy shower. Closing the door, she waited for the water to get warm and stripped, stepping into the shower. There was a soft tap on the door.

"Who is it?"

The reply was in Gallifreyan, so there was no doubt as to who it was.

"Come in, then."

He came bearing her shampoo, conditioner, and bar of soap. The warm water was too nice to leave so she merely stuck her arm out of the shower, accepting the offerings one by one. By the time he had joined her in the shower, she was lathering shampoo into her hair and calmly scrubbing. There was nothing sexual about this, merely the warm togetherness that they shared a bed with the evening previous. He helped her wash her back and legs, and he shaved his face at the same time that she shaved her legs. She washed her face as he rinsed shampoo from his hair. It was calm and slow, both of them still warm and drowsy from their bed. When they were both clean, he helped her dry her hair and as they dressed, she tied his bowtie for him. A little damp, but dressed and clean, they returned to their room and hung up their towels. She brushed her teeth while he fixed his hair. It was all very…domestic.

Oddly enough, it didn't bother him as much as he expected. Domesticity, the thing he had always sworn against, wasn't nearly as bad as he thought it would be. He kissed his wife's forehead, belly, and then her soft lips, wrapping his arms around her waist.

"What was that for?" She asked, smiling.

"Because you're gorgeous, and I love you."

"Sentimental now are we?" She teased gently, and kissed him back.

He inhaled the scent of her shampoo and smiled, sighing. "Is the baby hungry?"

"Always," she replied with a smile. And they exited their room and went to breakfast.


	16. Saturday Morning

**Really quick: I already know what the Doctor did to make Grandpa Tom angry, but it's about River's family so I'm going to wait until after I see AGMGTW to do that post, because I've accidentally seen a spoiler or two and if they're true, then I'll have to re-write the whole thing. This means that I'll either have my next few chapters take place at Rivers' grandparents' house or I won't have posts until early to mid-next week. In the case of me not-updating, I might post a few River-Doctor one-shots to keep myself writing. Best wishes and thanks! You all broke 100 reviews! **

Saturday Morning

Saturdays with the Doctor were always fun days. Sundays were boring and Thursdays were rubbish as well. Saturdays were the good days, days of fun and adventure and freedom. (To be fair, most days with the Doctor were like that, but he particularly liked Saturdays.) Hair damp from their shower, River and the Doctor emerged into the kitchen where plates were set next to the counter and Sophie was already perched on a bar stool eating fruit salad.

"Did you bring in the prenatal vitamins?" The Doctor asked River and she shook her head, eyeing the bowl of fruit salad and the omelet that her grandfather was frying.

"Why don't you get some food and I'll run and get them, all right?"

River responded by giving him a quick peck on the cheek as he jogged out the back door to fetch her tablets. After he had gone, she served herself some fruit salad and poured herself a glass of orange-mango juice.

"Is he treating you well, that man?" Sophie asked.

"Hardly a man," Tom grumbled, "Looks like he's in secondary school."

"Be nice, love. Have some tea, you'll feel better."

"Yes, Grandma, he's very good to me. He's a sweet man. A bit mad, but kinder than you could possibly imagine."

"I just want to be sure you're happy, dear."

"I'm very happy. He takes good care of me."

"He'd better," Tom grumbled.

"Drink your tea, love," Sophie advised.

"I don't want any tea!" he protested.

"You always get cranky when you don't have your tea."

"I do not! I'm not cranky," he protested.

"And I suppose you're not old either," she replied with a smile.

"Oh don't you start with me, woman," he grumbled good-naturedly.

"Then don't be such a grouch, you old softie."

Muttering grouchily, though his eyes twinkled, Tom sipped his tea, suppressing a smile at his wife.

"Old softie my foot," he muttered, smiling. "What do you want on your omelet, River?"

"Surprise me; anything but hot peppers."

"All right, one River surprise coming up." He cracked two eggs into a bowl, whisked them for a moment, and poured the liquid into a pan. River was finishing her fruit salad when the Doctor strode back through the back door holding a fat little bottle.

"They were behind the hand—" he paused, noticing his company. "…the hand lotion. Why in the world were they behind the _hand_ lotion?"

River smiled at him, her eyes twinkling mischievously. She knew full well that her prenatal vitamins weren't behind any sort of lotion at all.

"My hands have been dreadfully dry so I've been using hand lotion. I suppose I just took the vitamins in the morning when I put on the lotion. It's really nothing to make a fuss about."

"Well here they are, all…tablet-y and good for the baby."

River opened the bottle, dumped two tablets into her hand, and raised her glass in her husband's direction.

"Cheers," she said, tossing back her head to swallow the pills. She washed it down with juice just as her grandfather slid her finished omelet onto a plate and set it in front of her. Eagerly, River began bolting that down as well.

"Hungry, are you?" Her grandfather asked, "Careful to _chew_ your food, River."

"It's the baby," the Doctor replied, a little defensive, "She's nearly always hungry. And for the oddest things too."

"Well that omelet was your grandmother's favorite thing when she was pregnant with your mother. I hope it'll be as good for you…if you can taste it. You're inhaling the thing, River. Slow down a bit, you'll make yourself sick."

"She's hungry," the Doctor replied, still a little defensive.

Sophie shot her husband a look and pointed at his teacup. Shooting her a mock-scowl, he took a gulp of the tea and turned to his grandson-in-law.

"Would you like an omelet?"

"Oh please."

"With what on it?"

The Doctor looked around the kitchen, "I don't suppose you have any mangos?"

"We do," Tom replied, looking at the Doctor as though he had grown a second head.

"Excellent, I'll have mangos on my omelet."

"Mangoes," Tom repeated, disbelieving.

"Yes," the Doctor said, now beginning to look a bit confused himself.

"On your omelet," Tom repeated.

"Yes," the Doctor repeated. Both of them looked extremely puzzled at the other's words.

Shrugging with an air of 'I am surrounded by madmen' Tom began cutting up a mango to put in the Doctor's omelet. The Doctor happily helped himself to a cup of tea and sat down next to his wife, beaming at her.

She swallowed her mouthful of omelet and looked back at him, bemused.

"What?"

"It's a Saturday."

"Yes," she replied, smiling.

"So what are we _doing_, River?"

"Usual Saturday things," Sophie replied, her poker-face on. "The lawn needs mowing and neither of us can do it, as well as quite a bit of cleaning."

The Doctor looked horrified and he stopped sipping his tea to stare at Sophie, his mouth wide open. After a few moments of dead silence (except the sizzling of the frying pan), River and Sophie burst out laughing. There were tears running down River's face, she was laughing so hard.

"You should have seen your face!" she half-shouted between fits of hysteria.

The Doctor's face was still a mix of shock and disbelief and River laughed even harder.

"You just…I mean…your FACE!" She was laughing too hard for her to say much else.

"That wasn't very nice," the Doctor said, trying to suppress a smile.

"Nope," Tom replied, sounding distinctly more cheerful as he set the Doctor's mango omelet in front of him.

"Do you have any cheese?" the Doctor asked and Tom handed him a little bowl of grated cheddar cheese.

"I'm not even going to ask," he said.

"Ask about what?" the Doctor asked, bewildered, sprinkling cheese on his mango omelet.

"Never mind."

Shrugging, the Doctor picked up his fork and began to eat. Smiling cheerily at Tom, he chewed his omelet.

"This is fantastic, thanks."

Tom nodded, looking a little bit ill. "Glad you're enjoying it."

River had since gotten herself back under her control and was finishing her omelet.

"What are we really doing today?" the Doctor asked.

"Well usually I see my grand—child," Sophie began, catching herself. "But you're not allowed to meet yourself, so that's out, isn't it? What do you two usually do on Saturdays?"

"Oh everything," the Doctor said airily, taking another bite of omelet. "Saving the universe, running about, reading; all the usual things."

"Right," Sophie chuckled, "Silly of me. Well how about we go do something together as a family?"

The Doctor winced a little, picturing quaint little outings and dull conversation.

"Comet-surfing?" River asked eagerly.

"I really don't think that will be good for the baby," Sophie replied with another little chuckle. "I was thinking maybe the museum or a picnic. Maybe some racquetball. I'd want to play with the gravity because I'm not sure how anti-grav will affect the baby."

"The museum sounds nice," River said, watching the Doctor perk up over the idea. He loved museums; it was his way of keeping score.

"Your husband has to promise not to harass any of the curators."

"Does he do that often?"

"One of them had an emotional breakdown after meeting him. Your husband laughed though the entire tour."

"It was probably all wrong," the Doctor muttered in Gallifreyan.

"He'll behave," River promised.

"All right then. After breakfast, the museum!"

**Next chapter will be at a museum so you'll probably get at least one more before the week is up.**


	17. Keeping Score

**Minor edit: In the last chapter I said that the omelet was Sophie's favorite when she was pregnant with River's mom. But she's River's paternal grandmother; her dad's mom. So to clear things up, it was her favorite when she was pregnant with River's dad. Sorry for the mix-up.**

Keeping Score

"You only like being here for the gloating," River hissed as the Doctor beamed at the nice lady handing them their tickets.

"And what's wrong with that?" he asked, delighted. The man was bouncing on his heels and toes, rocking back and forth, looking rather like a large child who needed to use the toilet. River sighed and took his hand firmly in her own.

"You're supposed to behave, Doctor. I promised you would behave."

"I will behave," he replied, eyes flicking over to where River's grandparents were chatting with the ticket woman. "Are they coming soon?"

With another sigh, River took his face in her hands and pulled it towards her, so he was looking directly into her eyes.

"If you cause a riot, or an argument, or a scene, or any sort of disruption, I will personally ensure that you are as unhappy as my grandparents will make me. Are we clear?"

He nodded, moving her arms up and down as he did so. Then, with a sly little grin, he seized her face and kissed her quickly before straightening up and looking around. After a little smile, she took his hand again. Just because he said he wasn't going to cause trouble didn't mean that he wasn't going to involuntarily. And it was better if she had an eye on him in case that happened.

Sophie and Tom meandered towards them.

"See, River? They're showing a new exhibit about the ruins they found on Kestra 7. I thought you'd like that." Sophie told her, smiling all the while.

"Kestra 7?" the Doctor asked, beginning to grin.

"Behave," his wife reminded him forcefully in Gallifreyan.

"I will," he replied, a little petulant, but he soon recovered his excitement. "But River, it's Kestra 7! We've been there! Do you remember?"

"Yes, I remember. If I remember correctly, I have a plasma burn scar on my bum because of Kestra 7."

"I told you not to touch their statue."

"It was falling over! I thought it was going to break!"

"It was _meant_ to do that. And you wouldn't have the plasma burn if you hadn't brought along that blaster."

"And how am I supposed to look after you without something to shoot people with? There's always someone who wants you killed or at least maimed."

"Half the time it's you."

"And the other half, I end up keeping you from getting hurt."

"If the two of you are done squabbling in gobbledygook," Tom interrupted, "We'd like to go see the exhibit."

"Right, sorry," the Doctor replied in Standard, a language they understood. Or the Tardis translated it into Standard, anyhow. He just spoke and it was translated.

"Great; let's get on with this, shall we?" River said with a tight smile, gripping the Doctor's hand ever-tighter.

"Indeed," Sophie said, smiling as she picked up on River's slightly tense stance.

"Map says the exhibit's this way," Tom indicated a direction and they strolled after him.

The Doctor was fidgeting, his fingers wriggling and twitching, playing with something in his pockets. He wanted to run ahead and peer at everything and make loud, boastful corrections of the exhibits. Like a very bright child, he needed to be stimulated. He needed something to do. Remembering something, River let go of his hand for a moment and reached into his pants pocket, extracting the jingly thing that he was playing with—a metallic little puzzle. Though he nearly froze as her hand slipped into his pocket, he looked significantly less-than-pleased when she took his puzzle away.

"You're making noise, love." She spoke Gallifreyan to avoid her grandparents' input.

"I'm bored; we're moving too slow." He too spoke Gallifreyan.

"I know you are, but this is my family. Can you please _please_ try to act like a normal human? Please?" Her tone was pleading and she was speaking his native tongue. How could he refuse her something so small, so simple?

"I'll try," he replied, subdued slightly.

"Talk to the baby," she suggested, "Telepathically, just tell her things. If she likes the sound of my voice, she should like the telepathy too."

Smiling a little, he nodded and continued walking with her, able to keep pace with everyone else with very little tugging. His expression was mildly distracted and she could feel a faint buzzing in the back of her skull. She concentrated for a moment, analyzing the feeling. It was similar to the feeling that the baby's mind had given her, but stronger. She squeezed the Doctor's hand and tapped her head.

"I can feel you," she told him, still in Gallifreyan.

"It's all right; if it starts to hurt or you have trouble concentrating on anything, let me know."

She nodded and they reached the exhibit. River was astonished at the things they had collected. And how much was wrong! She wondered if this was how the Doctor felt all the time, having been places and then seeing totally inaccurate presentations on them. Inside a glass display case, a row of tools lay neatly, carefully labeled.

"Wrong," River whispered, a little delighted. She looked at the next display case, this one with pottery shards.

"Wrong…" she whispered again. She hurried on to the third case, pulling her husband by the hand.

"They're all wrong," she whispered, not bothering to switch to Gallifreyan.

"I know!" he replied, grinning.

"They've got no idea what they're talking about."

"I know!"

"This is brilliant! Is this how you feel in museums all the time?"

Beaming, he nodded.

"Yup."

"This is brilliant."

"Isn't it?"

They walked from display to display, pointing out errors softly to each other. The Doctor seemed content and because they were talking so quietly, they didn't disturb anyone else. Sophie and Tom were carefully reading the labeling cards for each display case and chatting softly about what everything said. It seemed that everyone was content. Except, as it is with the Doctor, it wasn't calm for long.

"Doctor," River called softly, having found a child's toy in the display case, "Look."

It was a carving of a giraffe-like creature, a little model made of wood. And it was strikingly familiar; it had belonged to a child that River and the Doctor had befriended during their little adventure on.

"It's Kirri's toy!" River exclaimed in quiet delight. "He probably lost it playing in the caves or something; you remember how he lost his other toy."

The Doctor tightened his grip on her hand,

"River," he said softly, and she looked up, unnerved by his sudden change of tone.

"What is it?"

He merely pointed. The little plaque noted that the toy had been found in a cave next to the skeleton of a child, its neck broken. The diagnosis was that the child had fallen.

"No, it can't be," she whispered. "Doctor, tell me it's not true."

He looked at the picture of the skeleton, then at the toy. His eyes were a little wet.

"I'm sorry," he whispered, tracing the picture with gentle fingertips. "Oh Kirri, I am so so sorry."

She turned and buried her face in his chest, wrapping her arms around his back. Even with the baby bump between them, there was still room for him to hold her tightly.

"I don't want to look at this anymore," she whispered into his chest. "Please, let's go somewhere else."

He nodded and let go of her, smoothing her hair from her face.

"Give me a moment, all right?"

He walked over to her grandparents.

"River saw the exhibit about the dead child and she's gotten quite emotional over it. We're going to go look a bit at the art, all right?"

Tom leaned to one side to look at his granddaughter, who was a little pale and drawn. He looked the Doctor up and down, and after a moment, nodded.

"You look after her, now."

The Doctor looked at his wife's grandfather, brown eyes old and dark and serious. He looked at this man, knowing one day that his granddaughter would die for him, knowing that he had already seen her die, knowing that he loved her more than anything in the world.

"I will always look after her, sir. Always."

Tom nodded, patting him on the shoulder.

"Go on, she's waiting."

And the Time Lord turned on his heel and walked back to the woman he loved.

XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX

They browsed the art section. The Doctor had met at least half of the artists and was familiar with all the styles. Chuckling, he pointed out paintings to her.

"They've hung half of them sideways," he snorted, wrapping an arm around her waist.

"Play nice, sweetie," she admonished gently, smiling along with him.

"If I'm meant to play nicer, then they ought to at least play smarter. I mean look at this! It's a portrait and it's hung upside-down!"

"That's a portrait?"

"Yes. It's a fryyls, and they don't have heads. See that thing that looks sort of trunk-like? It's a trunk. They've got tentacles at the top. The whole thing is absolutely wrong!"

His voice was beginning to rise and she gently tugged on his hand.

"Hush now, love. You're attracting attention."

There was a woman in the crowd and upon seeing the Doctor, her eyes narrowed. She stormed up to the Doctor, knocking River slightly to one side. Stumbling, River caught herself and looked over to see the woman approaching her husband in a more-than-menacing fashion.

"Hey!" she shouted, "You back away."

The woman whirled and in place of her face there was a digital readout. It was as though her face had been replaced with some sort of control pad; it was a translucent grey with winking lights and a little black dial where her left temple ought to have been. River swallowed, momentarily stunned. From where her face ought to have been, a red light shot out, like a laser, and scanned her up and down. A light blipped on her readout-face-thing. Rotating sharply, she rushed towards River, who pulled out her plasma gun.

"You get any closer and I'll blow your blessed electric brains out, you hear?"

"You brought a gun to a _museum_?" the Doctor asked in the background, "Really, River?"

"More are coming," the robot-woman-thing bleeped.

"What?"

"More are coming. They want it."

"Want what?" River's arm didn't waver, but her voice did.

"The child of a Time Lord."

The thing lunged and River fired once, twice, three times. She was shaking uncontrollably, sitting on the floor, staring at the robot, one hand on her belly. The Doctor was at her side, sliding the gun from her hand.

"They want our baby," she whimpered, clutching her midsection protectively.

"They're not getting it," the Doctor told her, eyes like flint and with a voice that River had come to associate with danger.

Museum guards rushed to the scene, where they found a very annoyed-looking man with credentials proving that he was an agent of the Artificial Intelligence Management Bureau.

"Sorry for the damage," the man said. "The thing went absolutely mad, was heading to disturb one of the paintings." He indicated the painting in question, which was indeed a little askew.

"All right," one of the guards said, "Thanks mate. We'll have a janitor come clean her up."

"Actually, I need her for circuitry analysis. But any extra bits left behind are free to be incinerated."

"Of course," the guard nodded along with his explanation.

"Well if that's all, I'll be heading off. Got to work out what made her go wrong." Smiling, he tossed the robot-woman's body over his shoulder and strode off. River joined him, still trembling, trying to work out what had gone on, how anyone had known that the Doctor was to have a child.

Despite the fact that he was bearing a robot-body over one shoulder, he glanced back towards the art exhibit for one moment before going out a side door. River looked at him, confused, as he smiled a little. After a moment, her face grew suspicious.

"You turned the painting right-side-up again, didn't you?"

The Doctor looked over at her, a little smirk playing at one edge of his mouth. And despite the danger, despite the fact that she was terrified, she chuckled wetly.

"You're impossible."

He laughed lightly, eyes still dark and worried.

"Not impossible, love; just very very good."

"And incredibly full of it," she muttered.

He smiled and muttered something rather naughty in her ear in Gallifreyan. After she had given him a look that said 'is now the time for such things?' he turned to her.

"Call Tom and Sophie and tell them we'll meet them at the house."

She pulled a phone from her pocket and dialed, briefly explained that they had needed to go back to the house, and assured them that she was all right, just that when they got back, they needed to talk. The Doctor looked over at her, running a hand over her back soothingly.

"Don't you think for a moment that they'll get our baby, love. I'll find who it is and they won't lay a finger on you or our child."

She nodded slowly, leaning into him.

"How did they know?"

"We'll soon find out."

**I realize that though I haven't seen AGMGTW, this sounds suspiciously similar, AKA they want the baby. However, it's a baby Time Lord. A Time Lord's body is a miracle. There's reason for it. And I'll do my best not to make it like the episode.**


	18. All Over Again

**I have now seen 'A GOOD MAN GOES TO WAR.' This (and probably the following chapters) will contain SPOILERS. You have been warned. Also, the concerns I had about making this like that episode are no longer a concern. I'm not brilliant or Stephen Moffat…so…no worries there. **

**Edits/Corrections!**

_Now that I know that River is Amy's daughter, there will need to be some minor editing. For one thing, let's assume that (as stated in Chapter 5, 'Timing is Everything') she wasn't a mildly neglectful parent. Let us also assume that her brief little dip into the time stream didn't affect her BECAUSE she's at least part Time Lord herself. And let us also assume that she had a cursory knowledge of Gallifreyan because of being around the Doctor all the time, but the rest about her learning it is accurate. And she's still part human so let's suppose that she's assuming her baby would be at least part human and that's why they need both baby books. Also, as stated, Sophie kept her maiden name, but Tom's last name is Williams because he's Rory's dad. As for the time period bit…I've accepted that this story is now AU, though I'll try to keep it as canon as possible. Thanks!_

All Over Again

"They needed you to hurt me when you were a baby, remember? They needed you to become a weapon. Why do they want _our_ baby?"

He was pacing, always pacing, her Doctor. Back and forth he paced, across her grandparents' rug with a robot body slung onto their couch.

"I don't know," she hissed. Her eyes were teary and she was trembling slightly, one hand on her belly and the other on the holster of her gun.

"There _has_ to be a reason, there has to be."

"Doctor, that's not the issue right now!" she half-shouted, "What about keeping her safe! What about keeping our baby safe?"

"I'm working on it!" he half-shouted back.

"Pacing across the rug isn't helping right now!"

They were standing now, shouting in each others' faces.

"Well what am I supposed to do, River? I don't know everything!"

"Well you should!" she returned, her voice cracking, "I need you to know everything! I need you to protect our baby!"

"How the hell am I supposed to do that? I don't even know what they want yet! I'm a Time Lord, not a god!"

"You're a father!"

"Yeah and I did a bang-up job of it last time, didn't I? I killed everyone, River; my whole planet! My parents, my wife, my children! I killed my own children, River! I don't think that really sets me up for a great career as a father this time around!"

The last part, the bit about his people, was bitter. He spat the words out as though they tasted vile, and shoving the broken robot to the side, he dropped onto the couch, face in his hands, and elbows on his knees, running his fingers through his dark hair. She could _feel_ him hurting; it was odd, how she could do that sometimes. She supposed it was the Time Lord bit of her.

She crouched, settling herself on her knees. Carefully, she pushed his legs apart and knelt between them, removing his hands from his face with careful fingers. He did not break, he _never_ broke, but here he was, close to tears, remembering all that he had done. She recalled once that Amy—her mother—had said once that the Doctor knew the Dream Lord was really a manifestation of himself because the Dream Lord was the only person who hated the Doctor as much as he hated himself. And she realized in a flash that this was difficult for him too. He had lost everything there was to lose, destroyed it because he had no other choice. And now he was faced with potentially losing everything again.

Removing his hands from his face, she looked up into his eyes, so dark and old, and now, frightened.

"I'm sorry."

"What if I can't do it, River? What if I can't save her? What if I can't save you? I couldn't do it last time…I couldn't save them."

She settled herself on the floor and gently pulled him into her lap, as though he was a little child. He was heavy, but it didn't matter. The main thing, the _only_ thing that mattered was that he understood that he was not alone, that he would never have to be alone again. She spoke Gallifreyan because she knew that he loved hearing it from her lips.

"You won't lose us," she whispered, kissing his forehead, currently resting on her shoulder. Her arms encircled him, holding him as he had held her so many times, so damn often that she had last count. He closed his eyes and a tear leaked from one, trickling down his face until it trembled on the tip of his nose. With one finger, she carefully wiped the tear away and gently kissed each of his closed eyelids, so gently that he barely felt it. His cheeks were already damp with tears that had squeezed out from underneath his eyelids, suffering his loss, his great and unimaginable loss.

"I'm sorry I shouted; I'm just frightened. And I know you're frightened too," she whispered, holding him tightly to her.

"Can we be frightened together?" he asked. His voice was so small at that moment, so like that of a lost child, that she held him closer.

"There's no one that I would rather be frightened with."

"But what if I can't save you?" it was barely a whisper, and his eye leaked another treacherous tear. Ever-so-carefully, she kissed his cheek where the tear glistened, a crystal star on his face, and then his mouth, his lower lip full and trembling, trying to suppress his fear, trying to be brave.

"Darling, I have never doubted you for a second. And I know that no matter what, no matter how, you will always be there to catch me when I fall."

He was crying silently, tears rushing down his face, and she knew then what he had lost. For just a brief moment she _understood_ his loss, felt it as though it was her own.

"But what if I'm not?"

She kissed him again, sweetly and carefully, as though afraid that he might break.

"Then I'll hang on until you get there."

She held him like he was a child. She held him like he was her husband. She held a lost, lonely little boy and an impossibly old man. She held the man who had killed his people trying to save everyone. She held the man who laughed at nothing and played at being omnipotent, and the man who every single day tried to laugh away the darkness within himself. She held the Oncoming Storm and the helpless child and the man she loved. She held him for a long while, trying somehow to make it all okay. They sat there, holding each other, for a long while.

He slipped off her lap and onto the floor beside her, and there in her grandparents' living room, he kissed his wife with a slow luxurious grace that elicited a quiet little cough from the couple that had just entered their home. Sophie took in the Doctor's teary eyes and River's distressed expression,

"What's wrong?"

"Someone wants our baby," River replied gravely.

"Do you know why?"

"Not yet."

"I'll make some tea."

As she walked out, River looked up at her grandfather,

"She didn't ask about the robot-corpse-thing on her couch."

Oddly enough, her grandfather smiled.

"Sweetheart, you've left much odder things on our couch.

He left the couple sitting on the floor holding each other to go help Sophie with the tea. The Doctor gently stroked her face with his thumbs, drinking her in, his gaze almost hungry. It took them ten minutes to move to the couch where he sat with one arm around her shoulders and one of hers around his waist. Sophie returned with tea and scones, steaming slightly. The Doctor inwardly wondered how Rory wasn't round and fat with such food in his house all the time.

River helped herself and Sophie poured tea.

"So what have you done so far?"

"He's been thinking."

"That doesn't seem very productive," Tom interjected, and River stiffened, defensive. _She_ was allowed to criticize the Doctor. He was not.

"He's planning," she defended, "He's clever and he's planning."

Tom raised his hands in surrender, "Just trying to work out what's going on, sweetheart. Don't jump down my throat."

"Sorry," River muttered. Her hands rested protectively on her belly, small though it was. The Doctor looked up from his teacup.

"I need to take the robot back to the Tardis. Actually, I need to take River back as well. No offense to the both of you but it's just safer. The Tardis is virtually indestructible and she'll be safe in there."

"What about the baby?" Sophie asked.

"We'll be back for the next check-up." The Doctor was already preparing to go, lifting the robot's stiff form over one skinny shoulder.

"You were staying the weekend," Sophie began sadly, but the Doctor shook his head. "I know, but right now I just want her safe."

Sophie nodded slowly and they gathered their things quickly and walked back to the Tardis. River hugged her grandparents.

"If you need anything at all, love, you call us." Her grandfather wasn't asking. He was telling. River smiled and kissed his cheek, knowing that even if she did need something, her grandfather wasn't the one whom she would call. That was what her father was for.

They walked into the Tardis and he started up its engines. River closed her eyes for a moment, listening to the steady vroop vroop vroop of her dematerialization. They were in the time vortex now. They were safe. Except…in the rush, River realized that she had forgotten something dreadfully important; their baby notebook.

"Doctor, we have to go back; I forgot the baby's notebook."

"I don't want you leaving the Tardis," he said firmly, and after having watched his reserve crumble as she cradled him in her arms, she didn't have the heart to say no. He flipped switches, turned dials, pumped things that needed pumping and whacked things that didn't really need whacking, but he liked to whack things with the rubber mallet so the galaxy help him, he was going to whack things with a rubber mallet and no one would tell him otherwise.

They arrived on the Williams' back lawn and the Doctor pointed at his wife.

"I will be back in less than two minutes. Don't you move an inch."

Nodding slowly, she let him leave. As the door shut, she remembered that her grandmother had said that they had been there the day before. As this realization hit her, she dashed towards the door of the Tardis; all bets were off now. The Doctor was somehow getting himself into trouble with her family.

**AND THAT'S WHY ITS CALLED CLIFF-HANGER!**

**Anyone with **

**Questions**

**Reviews**

**Suggestions or guesses as to HOW the Doctor angers Tom**

**PUT IT IN MY REVIEW SECTION! **

**And let me emphasize once more…AGOODMANGOESTOWARWASAWESOME!**


	19. Miscommunication is Easy

Miscommunication is Easy

She didn't know how she could have forgotten about this; it was incredibly absent-minded of her to forget that her husband had somehow offended her grandfather. She tossed open the door of the Tardis and dashed in after her husband. She ran across the yard, noting the little girl on the tree-swing…herself as a child. Damn. She rushed into the house.

"River!" the Doctor shouted, "I told you to stay in the Tardis. I _told_ you to stay, but did you listen? Of course not."

"You're about to make a complete fool of yourself," River explained, rapid-fire. "We're a day before we arrived."

"What are you two going on about?" Tom asked, and the Doctor held up a finger, indicating that he should wait.

"We're going to arrive for my check-up tomorrow," River told her grandfather.

"And you're going to get back in the Tardis before you cease to exist," the Doctor ordered. "You saw yourself on the swing. If you can get back into the Tardis with minimal contact, you'll stay here. What did I tell you about staying in the Tardis?"

"Hang on just one minute," Tom growled, "You cannot threaten my granddaughter."

"I'm not threatening her," the Doctor began, but shook his head, "I don't have time for stupid questions right now. Just…keep young River away from this River."

"It wasn't a stupid question," River began and the Doctor waved a hand at her, "Not now, River."

"What is going on?" Tom boomed.

Sighing, the Doctor put on his most condescending tone and said as fast as he could and still be understandable,

"River crossed her own timeline and if she contacts her younger self then she will create a paradox which will rip a big hole in space-time and will cause a whole lot of problems for everyone involved including the possibility that she will cease to exist. Capice? Now if you don't mind, I need to get my wife back in the Tardis before she accidentally destroys the universe. Is that all right with you?"

Tom scowled at him,

"Young man, you would do well to speak more carefully."

"I'm over nine-hundred years old," the Doctor snapped at him, steering River out the door. "So I think I can talk however I like."

"I think if you'd like to remain around my granddaughter, then you'd better learn some respect."

"I think that you'd better recall who it is that you're dealing with before you make threats," the Doctor told him, deadly serious.

The door slammed behind him as he strategically avoided young River, shoving his wife into the Tardis as little Melody Pond bounded up to him.

"Doctor!" she squealed delightedly.

"Not today, Melody—River—whoever. I'm in a bit of a rush. Go look after your grandfather; I've made him rather cross."

The little girl nodded solemnly at him and bounded away towards the house as he rushed into his Tardis, running directly into his wife, who was fuming.

"Oh...dear."

His voice seemed to die in his throat under his wife's furious glare.

"What was all that about?"

"Sorry, I was in a rush, trying to prevent a hole in space-time," he returned, a bit frustrated by the fact that she was frustrated by his rudeness rather than grateful that they were all still in one piece.

"You're brilliant in a crisis and you couldn't manage to be polite to my grandfather for two minutes?"

"What part of 'hole in space-time' did you not understand?"

"I don't want to talk about this."

Putting a hand to her head, she stormed out of the console room. The Doctor punched one of his chairs, frustrated at himself more than at her. She had pregnancy hormones flying all over the place and he really could have been more polite to Tom.

He ran his fingers through his hair and typed in the coordinates he wanted with a little more force than necessary, taking out his aggression a little bit on the Tardis. As he realized what he was doing, he stopped, patting the console gently.

"Sorry, Sexy. I'm just not doing very well today."

The Tardis flickered the lights at him and materialized where and when he needed her to. Sheepishly, he walked out onto her grandparents' back lawn and _knocked_ of all things on their back door.

Sophie opened the door and looked the blushing Doctor up and down.

"You came from two days ago?"

He nodded sheepishly and Sophie handed him the diary that he had been after.

"Tom's forgiven you, love. Just try to be a bit more polite in the future…or the past. However this happens for you."

Nodding meekly, he accepted the diary and returned to the Tardis. He already could predict where his wife would be and what she would be doing.

**Any guesses as to where River is and what she's doing? (AKA her upset-and-pregnant ritual.) If you guess correctly, you win a prize! …ha ha yeah right. I apologize for the shortness of this chapter.**


	20. Actually Talking is Hard

Actually Talking is Hard

By now, the Doctor had learned River's rituals for when she was upset. Oddly enough, when she became pregnant, her upset-rituals altered. There was a lot more eating of sweets and a lot less hitting things or shooting things. However, twenty whole weeks of pregnant River had gotten his accustomed to these habits.

If she was sad about something, River could be found in her old bedroom, the one she stayed in before they were married and began to share his bed. She could generally be found with a chocolate bar and the large plush bear that he had bought for her on her eighth birthday. More often than not, she was also crying. He knew that she hated crying and that it was the pregnancy hormones doing it to her, so he generally brought an offering of some sort and kissed the tears from her cheeks.

If River was frightened, (this was more common now as well; she worried about their baby an awful lot) she could be found in the library or in their bedroom. In the library she has a little nook in the back and could generally be found behind a book larger than was really necessary for any book to be. Her favorite, he had noted, was an atlas of Gallifrey. Page seventy-two had a permanently wrinkled bottom-left corner where she had once tear-stained the page and it had re-dried crinkly. If she was in their bedroom, she could be found either in their bathroom taking a shower or curled up in their bed. She cried then too; she hated that crying was her default setting when she was upset now. She didn't used to cry, she was strong before these hormones took a hold of her body and messed with her emotions. The idea that she had no control over her body also made her want to cry. It was a vicious and painfully annoying cycle.

When she was angry, however, she had a very specific, very River sort of ritual. It involved a four-step process. The Doctor thought for a moment, calculating the amount of time that had passed. Between his retrieval of the diary and his brooding, maybe ten minutes had passed. That put her on…step two. The Doctor prepared to walk through a good half-mile of corridors. Sexy was siding with River; typical. As he began walking, he mentally went through River's angry-and-pregnant ritual.

First, she went to the kitchen and made herself what she as a child had referred to as a 'Doctor sundae.' He himself just called it a sundae, but he was the Doctor. The 'Doctor sundae' consisted of vanilla ice cream which was then topped with little frozen peanut-butter pieces and sliced banana, then doused in hot fudge. Topping it all off was a pile of whipped cream and a maraschino cherry. She never told him that he had made them for her when she was a little girl, only that he introduced them to her. He never mentioned that she introduced them to him. It was yet another paradox of their relationship.

After consuming her sundae, she proceeded on to the shooting range, which Sexy had apparently made just for her. Inside the shooting range was an enormous metal block that she used as a target for her plasma gun. After at least a year of use (she had been using it pre-pregnancy), the block was beginning to take on the look of an abstract art piece. The metal was layered in colors too, so the makeshift sculpture was pretty in its own way. It was scorched and melted, dented and pockmarked. The Doctor wondered what it would eventually become.

Once the shooting was done, River took her pregnant self into the study. Problem was there were at least three studies, aside from his personal study. And as she was generally angry with him, she usually stayed out of his study in protest of whatever he had done at the time. Once in the study, she wrote in her diary and/or looked at the fetal development books, remembering that her emotions affected the baby. This step generally took the most time and this was usually when the Doctor found her, armed with an apology.

If he didn't find her, she went for a swim to work off all the frustration. River liked swimming; half because it was good for the baby and half because she liked the weightlessness of floating in the pool, the caress of the cool water on her skin. The Doctor could find here in the pool, provided that Sexy didn't move it, or River didn't move it, if she was particularly angry with him.

As the Doctor arrived at the empty shooting range, he realized that he had forgotten to calculate in the time it would take him to muster up his courage and walk all the way to River's shooting range. At this rate, she was probably already in one of the multiple studies. With a sigh that was exaggerated for the hope of Sexy's shortening his walk, he began on his way to the nearest study. The Tardis hummed at him, and he grumbled in Gallifreyan about ungrateful machines under his breath. Sexy shuddered, making him stumble. As he got up, he rubbed his arm, which he had banged in his fall, and glared in the general direction of the Tardis console.

The first study was empty, as was the second. The third had a glass of water that he recalled leaving in the room perhaps a week and a half ago. The fourth study was in a state of disarray that only someone looking for something (or him working on a project) could have caused. There were two others, but he decided to skip them in favor or his study. Chances were that's where she was. He paused for less than a second, calculating to see if she would be in the pool by now. Hard to tell, but he thought that she might still be in stage three. With another overdramatic sigh and a pointed look at no one in particular, he made his way to his private study.

When the Doctor said 'private study,' what it really meant was 'study that was overly difficult to get to, to discourage companions from wandering in.' Naturally, River found it relatively rapidly and had no qualms about popping in and laying on his couch, writing or reading or napping. Arriving at his own closed study door, the Doctor looked right and left, as though about to cross the street. By then he really should have had a policy on how to approach River when she was cross, but he didn't. He stood in front of the door, unsure whether to knock or just open the door.

"It's your study, just go in," he muttered to himself under his breath, and he opened the door and walked in.

The study was not something that the average companion would expect from the Doctor. With all his energy and childish antics, people often forgot that he was nine-hundred years old and brilliant. The floor was hard wood, most of it blanketed by an enormous hand-woven carpet. The designs changed at you looked at them, somewhat like a Rorschach test, but with lines and patterns. Everyone saw something different. The Doctor saw the universe, galaxies dying and being born, stars flickering. River saw a pattern, ever changing, ever-weaving around, unraveling and reweaving itself. One wall was entirely bookshelves in wood that looked like mahogany but wasn't, and another was mostly taken up by a large fireplace and mantle. On the mantle were assorted knick-knacks that looked very pretty and shiny. Eight out of the ten of them were priceless and the other two he had made himself. Except to him, nobody knew which were which. A dark wooden desk, also enormous, sat on one side of the room, away from the door. His couch lay perpendicular to the desk, against another wall. Two chairs with green upholstery sat in front of the fireplace.

His desk was spotless except for a stack of papers in the center, haphazardly balancing on a book in Gallifreyan. Books and several framed photographs were placed with almost obsessive precision along the desk's edge, facing his comfy (and extremely professional-looking) chair. He scanned the office, looking for River. He knew she was in here, he could feel it. Scanning the room, puzzled, he found her sitting on the edge of the fireplace, diary in her lap. When she looked up, her eyes were red.

"Hello love," he greeted her tentatively.

"Hello Sweetie," she replied calmly.

"I'm sorry that I got cross with your granddad," he mumbled, feeling very like a schoolboy whom had been naughty.

"I'm sorry I shouted at you."

He sat down beside her on the brick edge of the fireplace. His bricks were black, shiny, and made from star cores. They also sparkled when a fire was lit, but that was beside the point. Putting a careful arm around her shoulders, he looked over at her.

"We're fighting a lot more now, aren't we?"

She nodded glumly.

"I'm sorry; it's my fault. It's these bloody hormones."

"It's not your fault, River. Nobody could have known how your body would react to being pregnant and with _my_ baby at that. And human pregnancies have hormones all over the place; you're human-plus. It's safe to assume that you'd take things to the extreme."

She sighed and leaned against him,

"You're so good to me."

"It's only fair, love. You're the only person who knows how to make my tea properly, other than me of course."

"_That's_ the only reason you're good to me?" she asked, playfully offended.

"Well there are other reasons, Doctor Song, but there are little ears listening, and I wouldn't want to scar our child before it's even born."

"Do you really think that she can hear us?"

"I know it can hear your voice and I know that it can hear me when I talk to it telepathically. The baby doesn't understand, but it likes the noises." The Doctor tried to not specify the baby as a she; that was River's opinion, not his. He was certain that there was no way she could know what their child's sex was.

"You can tell what she likes?"

"Well, the baby doesn't really have developed emotions like you and I understand them, but it does, in a way. So yeah, the baby is happy when we talk to it. It likes the sounds of our voices."

"Well considering I'm not telepathic, she will at least be able to distinguish the difference between us."

"Well I'm undeniably sexy," the Doctor said. "It would be terribly difficult to confuse me with someone else."

She whacked him lightly in the chest,

"If this baby inherits your ego, the universe is doomed, you know."

"You can't inherit ego, River. However, if the baby does have a big ego, it's not as though it isn't a reasonable one. I mean, it's got a Time Lord father and you, my love, are undeniably the cleverest, most beautiful woman in the entire universe. I'll actually be concerned if the little tyke _doesn't_ have an ego."

"Oh Doctor," River laughed flirtatiously, "Flattery will get you anywhere."

He raised his eyebrows suggestively,

"Anywhere?"

Laughing again, she hugged him,

"I've got another idea, actually."

"Does it involve handcuffs?" he asked.

She thought for a moment, then smiled, eyes sparkling with mischief.

"It could…if you wanted it to…"

Like a gentleman, he helped her to her feet.

"Lead the way," he invited, allowing her to walk first from the study.

He was disappointed when they ended up in the Library with a Scrabble board. Well…a little disappointed. But he could always convince her to play with the handcuffs later.

**I have made a variation on the 'Doctor Sundae' and it is DELICIOUS. My version used melted peanut-butter instead of the frozen bits, and chocolate syrup because I had no fudge…or maraschino cherries. Its creation inspired me to put it in the story….actually…I might eat one once I post this…**


	21. Pieces of the Puzzle

Pieces of the Puzzle

He waited until she had gone to bed to work on the robot. Astonishingly, she had beaten him at Scrabble. He protested loudly and indignantly, but River insisted that only _real_ _human English_ words were allowed, and however much he wanted the triple-word score, allons-y was still French. He pouted for a little while, but was consoled by the fact that she unintentionally (actually very intentionally, but he didn't know that) set him up to get extra points with the word 'banana'. She still won, but he was pleased enough with his little victory that it didn't much matter. After a quick kiss, she went off to bed and he waited until he was sure she was in their room to retrieve the robot body and get to work.

After thinking about the robot all afternoon, it was a relief to pull out his tools and begin tinkering with the thing. The front panel had been deadlocked to prevent him from sonic-ing it open, so the Doctor borrowed the squareness gun that Jack had left in the Tardis some two years earlier. He knew that it would someday be River's, but right now it was a means to an end. He aimed the squareness gun at the rubbery fake-flesh of the robot woman's chest and pulled the trigger. Immediately there was the smell of burning flesh and singed metal.

"No no no no no!" he shouted, sonic-ing the table the body was on, typing in instructions on the keypad. A force field sprung up over the body and sucked the oxygen and other gasses away from it.

"Ha ha, thought you could get me with that, did you?" he muttered to the body. Through the transparent force field he could see circuitry entwined with human organs. Slumping slightly, he ran a hand through his hair.

"Oh you poor poor thing. Look what they've done to you."

After insuring that the acidic gas wouldn't spray again, he tapped the table's keypad and the force field vanished. Gently, he ran a hand over the robot-thing's hair. It was dark brown and straight. The roots of it were a mousy color—the woman had dyed her hair once.

"You used to be a person and they killed you and used you for parts. Oh I'm sorry. I'm so sorry."

River stood at the door to the lab, dressed in a loose nightgown and looking very like a child except for her pregnant belly. He looked up at her, his eyes tired and worried and sad. Walking over to him, she pulled him into a hug.

"Did you think I didn't know what you were doing?" she asked softly.

"I didn't want you to worry."

"But _you_ would worry, sweetie."

He kissed her hair distractedly and turned back to the robot-human-thing on the table.

"She used to be a person, River. And they killed her and turned her into _this_."

"I know, my love. And we're going to work out who did this to her."

He looked over at his wife.

"You should get some sleep, River. You need your rest."

"I'll go to bed when you do," she told him, and pulled her hair away from her face with an elastic band. "Now…what have we got here? Pass me the scanner, would you?"

Half-smiling, he passed her the scanner and she took readings, her brow wrinkling.

"Now that's odd…"

"What?"

"Hand me that scalpel, would you?"

Smiling slightly less now, he handed her the laser-scalpel and she made an incision in the woman's liver, revealing a glimmer of silver. She put on a pair of gloves and selected a pair of tweezers from the tray next to the table.

"What do we have here?" The little box she had pulled from the woman's liver had a tiny blinking light on top of it, a tiny blue bulb that flickered.

"Transmitter?" he suggested.

"Looks like it," she agreed.

"Pass me that scalpel?" he asked.

She handed him the laser-scalpel and he carefully cut away a patch of the woman's skull, now reinforced with metal. Her brain was dead now, but it had at least a dozen tiny pins stuck in it, little lights on the tips of the pins dead."

"I think I know how you turned her off," the Doctor remarked, adjusting the squareness gun and aiming it where River's plasma-bolts had penetrated the thing's chest. Her heart, now a mass of destroyed flash, was covered in wires and attached to a circuit board. River leaned over to peer at it too.

"They used her body as a power supply system and just added their own technology," she remarked.

"Yeah, but how did they do that? They had to kill her to install all this, but they'd have to re-start her heart to get her to work again."

"I could have killed her," River whispered, going very white and stepping away from the body.

"No, River. She was already dead, you must understand that. She had no brain-activity. Her body was a shell being used and controlled…like a virus invades a cell."

River nodded slowly, still looking very pale and a bit sick.

"Here," the Doctor said, offering her the tiny transmitter. "Clean this off and we can see where the signal is transmitting _to_."

Nodding, River took the little transmitter and carefully washed it with a chemical solution that wouldn't damage any of the circuitry. Only after she took it out of the solution, the little blue light had gone out.

"Doctor! It stopped transmitting."

"What?" He washed off his hands quickly and picked up the box, peering at it inquisitively before handing it back to River. Frowning, he pulled out the sonic and aimed it at the box, giving it a three-second burst—nothing. He readjusted the sonic and gave the box another burst. Again, the light remained dark.

"Why have you turned off?" he asked the little box.

"Well the chemical bath turned it off…maybe it broke something inside the transmitter," she suggested.

"That's possible…or…oh I wonder. Are you this clever?" he asked the box, plucking it from River's grasp. Carefully, he dipped it back into the pool of blood in the robot-woman's liver and then sonic-ed the transmitter again. The little blue light flickered back on.

"Oh that's clever. That's very clever. It uses blood to complete the circuit and keep it going, so if you take it out and clean it, it stops working, effectively looking like it's broken and preventing the little beauty from telling us who it's talking to! Ha!"

Bouncing around, he sonic-ed the transmitter and with a flick of his wrist checked the readings on the sonic. His beaming grin turned into a faint frown.

"And that's not polite at all, is it?"

River, now sitting in one of the chairs, watched him with amusement that was slowly turning into drowsiness.

"What is it?" she asked, attempting to cover up her drooping eyelids by opening her eyes wider, trying to look more alert than she actually was.

"It's bouncing me off of other places, just like you can do with internet signals. It's re-routing the signal through a bunch of places to make it harder to track. And the moment that we arrive at one of those places, you can bet that they'll be onto us and stop transmitting."

"Oh," River said, stifling a yawn. "Well can you track it anyhow?"

"Well of _course_ I can," he replied, surprised that there was even a question of his capability. "It'll take a little time though. You ought to go to bed."

"Isn't it still transmitting?"

"Yes, of course."

River took a Petri dish and carefully filled it with the woman's blood, then plucked the transmitter from his fingers and set it in the dish, putting a force field back over the body. She set the Petri dish on another table and plugged it into the computer in the wall, selecting a program.

"There; it'll track the signal automatically." She tapped the screen with his finger, "And it should take five or six hours."

He scrambled over to look at the screen, which was currently charting the signal's course across space and time.  
>"You're clever, aren't you?"<p>

"My doctorate seems to indicate that I am."

"In _archaeology_," he muttered, flapping a hand at her.

"Your _archaeologist_ is responsible for tracking the signal back to its source, so you'd do well to respect the doctorate for once."

"I _could_…"

She tried to scowl at him and ended up yawning.

"You really ought to go to bed," he said again.

"I'm waiting until you go to bed," she replied, "You know that you'll be up all night and get no sleep at all if you don't."

"So I suppose there's only one solution to this problem," the Doctor replied. He scooped up his wife, bridal-style and carried her back to their bedroom. Laying her carefully on the bed, he took a moment to brush his teeth and pull strip down to his boxers, which were black and patterned with swirling nebulae. Pulling off his socks, he climbed into bed.

"Happy now?" he asked, feeling his body relax, feeling it begin to accept its drowsiness.

"Mmm-hmm," she mumbled.

"Goodnight River," he kissed her forehead.

"Don't you get up and go back to tinkering once I fall asleep," she mumbled at him.

"I won't."

"Promise me, Doctor." Only she could sound stern while half-asleep.

"I promise." He wrapped his arms around her, lying so his chest rested against her back, and pulled the covers over both of them. "I'm not going anywhere."

"Good."

It was the last thing she said before she fell asleep. Though the thoughts in his head churned like a stormy sea, he too was asleep in a few minutes, safe in his Tardis, his wife and child wrapped securely in his arms. A fiercely intense expression painted his slumbering face; protectiveness. Even as he slept, nothing would get to River. Nothing would get through him. Nothing could take them away if he only held them tight enough all through the night.


	22. Terribly Clever At Most Things

Terribly Clever (At Most Things)

He woke up before she did, of course. He needed less sleep as a Time Lord and as a non-pregnant person. However much he wanted to get up and check the status of the transmitter tracking, she was asleep in his arms and he didn't want to move.

It wasn't that she was dazzlingly beautiful when she slept, but every human slept in a special way, specific to their personality. River slept oddly; when she was with him, she moved very little, was entirely calm and rarely talked in her sleep or rolled over. By herself, she sprawled across the bed, kicking or rolling restlessly. She talked in her sleep often, but was rarely ever understandable. It was as though sharing his bed calmed her mind, put her at ease. And it did, but she would never admit it aloud, nor would he want her to. So silently, he watched her sleep, watching her chest rise and fall. After a while, he lay back down and closed his eyes.

_How in the universe did I get so lucky?_ he asked himself. She was warm and soft and the curves of her seemed to grow each day, like a fruit slowly ripening. Smiling, he buried his face in the nape of her neck, inhaling her scent. It was different now too, not in what she smelled like, but in the hormonal differences that human beings couldn't consciously register. He had to concentrate on it, but when he took the time to think about it, he could pinpoint exactly what changed. It was all very science-y and technical, so he preferred to just think of it as the smell of motherhood. It was simpler to say as well.

He knew that she wouldn't be awake for at least two hours, probably longer. But here she was, here he was and the bed was warm and soft. He closed his eyes and reached out his mind to touch that of his child.

_Hello love, _he said in a telepathic whisper. The baby was awake; it was usually awake when River was asleep. He could feel that the little creature was pleased with his voice but that it also didn't understand a word of what he was saying. So he told his child tales of Gallifrey, the fairy tales of his youth. He was very careful to make a little bubble for the two of them, to not touch River's mind. He didn't want to wake her or spoil the dream that was currently making her twitch the fingers of her left hand as she smiled, just a little, in her sleep.

He talked to his child for an hour at least, maybe two. And once he had finished yet another story, he decided that it was enough for one day and resolved to get up…in five minutes. Surely five more minutes in his own warm bed wouldn't do any harm? Inhaling River's scent and making circles on her belly with his thumb, he felt the minutes pass…one…two…three…four…five. With a silent sigh, he slowly and carefully disentangled himself from the covers and let go of his wife, pressing a kiss to her sleeping forehead. He tossed yesterday's clothes in the hamper and quickly showered and shaved before getting dressed, tying his bowtie, and pulling on his shoes. Best to be ready to run; that wasn't his motto, but it was a firm belief.

After snatching a banana from the kitchen and eating it in two bites, he tossed the peel in the trash can and rushed to the lab.

"Sexy, let me know when River gets up, will you? I want to make her breakfast."

The Tardis made an alarmed sounding squeal and he huffed,

"Sexy I swear to you that I will do minimal work and let all those clever kitchen gadgets that we got at our wedding do most of the work. And you can take over any time you like."

With a slightly placated-sounding sigh-like hum, the Tardis settled back into silence. The Doctor studied the monitor where a blinking green circle surrounded a tiny little moon of a planet about five-billion light years away and nearly ten thousand years back in time.

"Who hates me ten thousand years ago?" he pondered aloud. If River was awake, she would have had a witty and mildly insulting comeback to that, but she was currently unconscious in the bed he wished he was still in. After a moment, it came to him anyhow and he smiled, delighted despite the fact that someone was trying to take his unborn child.

"No…it can't be, can it? No…they wouldn't…would they? It's been so long, I'd have thought they'd have forgotten me by now…suppose not though. I _am_ pretty unforgettable."

The Tardis shifted the floor of the lab so he stumbled.

"Sexy! I _am_ unforgettable, so it's not just talk. Rude today aren't you?"

The Tardis flicked the lights in the lab on and off several times.

"Oh…River's awake, isn't she?"

The ventilation turned on for a moment, like a huff, and then off again.

"Right then…sorry for shouting."

The lights in the lab switched off and the Doctor made his way out into the hall, which _was_ lit. Through the halls he trotted and found himself in the kitchen. The stove flicked on and he put a skillet onto one of the burners. It wasn't that he couldn't cook, it was that he enjoyed taking liberties with the recipes too much and generally ended up botching the whole affair. Only four of his mad concoctions had caught on: the banana daiquiri, the grilled cheese sandwich, jelly (jell-o to Americans) and ham salad. Most of the rest had burnt, exploded, or only caught on among a small population of poorly-tasted individuals. That was the only way he could explain anyone enjoying his invention of vegemite, anyhow. Or marmite.

After promising the Tardis about nine times that he would not deviate from the recipe, he carefully made French toast, often looking in the general direction of the console room and muttering reassuring things under his breath.

With the Tardis's watchful eye over him and a recipe to follow exactly, he soon had a respectably small pile of French toast, which he set on the counter as he fetched syrup, fruit, powdered sugar, and plates. River entered the kitchen to find the kitchen table set neatly with tea and French toast, bacon on the side, and anything she could imagine wanting to top her breakfast with.

"Good morning," the Doctor grinned at her.

"Hello sweetie," she replied suspiciously, giving him a peck on the cheek before eyeing the table with a healthy amount of wariness. "Is this safe to eat?"

"The Tardis made me follow the recipe _exactly_." The disappointment was evident in his tone.

"So it's edible?"

The Tardis hummed and River nodded,

"Thanks, lovely."

She sat down to breakfast and began to eat, perfectly content. The Doctor was about to protest, but his stomach rumbled and he realized that a banana wasn't really breakfast so much as a snack and he had made enough for two…so he sat down and joined her to breakfast, piling enormous amounts of marmalade and chocolate syrup on a slice of French toast. River was brave enough to try this concoction and actually found it appealing enough to eat about half of it.

"You _hate_ chocolate-marmalade French toast!" he exclaimed, indignant. "The last time you tasted it, you nearly threw up!"

"_Your kid_ thinks it's delicious," she remarked before cutting herself another little piece and eating it from his plate.

"Well tell _my kid_ to stop nicking my food!" he protested a little childishly, blocking her fork from picking up another bite.

Rolling her eyes, she popped a strawberry slice into her mouth and finished her own breakfast.

"Do we have any pickles?"

"Yeah…back of the fridge. Why?"

River returned with the pickle jar and used a dill spear to mop maple syrup off her plate. The Doctor peered at her snack and leaned across the table.

"Can I have a bite of that?"

She allowed him a single bite before going back to her maple-and-dill pickle.

"Being pregnant gives you the same taste in food as me?" he asked, astonished.

"Apparently…can we have fish fingers and custard for lunch?"

"You have no idea how long I've been waiting for you to ask that."

XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX

Once breakfast was finished, he showed her the map.

"You'll never guess who sent that robot-woman."

"All right, so tell me."

"It's a moon of the Krillitane home world…there's a small group that lives there, Krillitanes who only believed in selecting certain species, the best of them, to add to their own genetic makeup. They wanted to create a perfect race…sort of like alien Nazis. Only I stopped them, took away their powers of travel, locked down their moon and halted their abilities to acquire new traits from other species."

"So…they took that badly then…"

"Yes. I don't know whether they want our baby for the genes or for the regenerative energy it'll be able to give off…but they want our child. Which is why…I think I'm going to need some help."

"Help, sweetie?"

He paused, though whether it was for dramatic effect or apprehension, she didn't know. He shot her a side-along glance.

"I think it's time we called your mum and dad."


	23. Blood is Thicker than Diesel Fuel

Blood is Thicker than Diesel Fuel

Amy and Rory were awoken at approximately five in the morning by an energetic six-year old bouncing on their bed.

"Mummy! Daddy! The Doctor's here! Also…I want pancakes for breakfast."

"Rory," Amy pleaded, burying her face in her pillow.

"Yeah, I'm taking care of it." Rolling out of bed, he scooped his little girl up under his arm.

"Did somebody say pancakes?" he rumbled at his daughter, whom shrieked wildly, kicking her legs as her father carried her down the stairs.

"Now is the Doctor really here, Melody? Or are you playing pretend agai—oh." The Tardis was sitting in the middle of his kitchen. "I suppose that answers that question."

The Doctor poked his head out of the door.

"Ah, Melody's here."

"Right," Rory agreed, and set his daughter down on the floor as the Doctor slipped from the Tardis, closing the door behind him. Melody Pond threw herself at the Doctor, hugging him round the middle.

"Doctor! You'll never guess what I made!"

"What did you make?"

"Well come _see_!"

"Melody, when was the last time you saw me?"

She looked up at him and a strikingly familiar grin lit up her face,

"Spoilers," she said in her tiny little six-year-old voice.

"Oh you rotten child," he laughed, picking her up and tossing her into the air, catching her neatly. "Why don't you go get what you wanted to show me?"

After the little girl had dashed off, Rory peered at the Tardis.

"Is River in there?"

"Yup."

"Where on the timeline are we?"

"Well we're married and…have we had that family picnic in Paris yet?"

Rory nodded, recalling when the Doctor and River had announced that they were expecting a child…

XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX

_"Doctor! River!" Amy exclaimed as they landed in the Pond-Williams' back garden. Melody was at school and Rory was home on a lunch break._

_ "Hello Ponds! Fancy a picnic in the city of love?"_

_ "Paris?" Amy squealed._

_ "Well it was either that or nearly any city in the 51__st__ century…actually those are more of the cities of lust…what with all the…" he cleared his throat loudly, blushing as River laughed, hugging her parents._

_ "Hi Mum, hi Dad, would you like to come to lunch with us?"_

_ "We have to be back here _on time_," Amy said sternly. "Rory's got to get back to work and Melody will be home from school in a couple of hours. We can't be a week late or anything."_

_ "I'll drive home," River smiled. She still wasn't quite the pilot that she would be in the Doctor's past, in her future, but she was good at getting to a very specific point in time._

_ "Well all right then, I'll go get my jacket," Amy replied, kissing her daughter and her best friend on their cheeks. Rory smiled at him in that way that only Rory could,_

_ "I'll make sure she doesn't put on anything too embarrassing."_

_ "Dad, I'm not thirteen anymore; Mum can wear anything she wants to."_

_ He laughed and turned towards their house. "You forget she used to be a kiss-o-gram; I'll go make sure she's presentable."_

_ River rolled her eyes and leaned against the Doctor. _

_ "How do you think they'll take it?" she whispered._

_ "Well, you're in school so that's a good sign. Melody was about four in their timeline when we were married, and you were…well…you. So I think enough time has passed for this to be okay…I hope. And Rory doesn't have his sword, so I feel a bit better about that."_

_ She smiled, turning to face him, pressing her hips against his,_

_ "Afraid of my father, Doctor? The bravest man in the universe is afraid of daddy-in law?"_

_ "He's got a sword, River…stop that. River we're in front of your house!"_

_ She was gently grinding her hips against his, smiling playfully as he shot anxious glances at her back door where Rory had just gone inside._

_ "We're about to tell them that I'm pregnant, sweetie. I think they'll accept that we've done everything necessary to produce this baby."_

_ "That doesn't mean they want a display, River!"_

_ "Oh, so I shouldn't mention how much you like those handcuffs that I got you as a wedding gift? Or the kitty ears and tail from my cat-burglar escapades?" She purred, pressing against him and smiling all the while, knowing that there was nothing he could do about it. Her arms around his neck toyed with the back of his bowtie._

_ "Doctor Song, keep this up and you might have to be punished later," he growled, voice low and warm._

_ "Excuse me?" Rory called, waving at the couple from across the garden. The Doctor jumped a little and tried to pull away, but River kept her arms around his neck._

_ "Yes, Dad?" she called. _

_ "Your mother wants to know if we're going in the winter."_

_ "What she's wearing is fine, Dad! It'll be warm!" River shouted back._

_ "Excellent; now tell your husband that I don't want to see that kind of behavior in my back garden."_

_ "I'm not—" the Doctor began, but River silenced him with a hand over his mouth. _

_ "Of course, Daddy!"_

_ "And don't think I don't know what you're doing, River; stop getting that man into trouble."_

_ Blushing a little, River took her arms from around the Doctor's neck._

_ "Thank you, Rory!" The Doctor called and the Centurion nodded at him, bellowing into the house,_

_ "Amy, we're not going to the court of the bloody Queen! We're going to lunch! Come on!"_

_ "Rory Williams, keep yelling and I'll stay up here another hour!"_

_ "Mum, come on!" River called, "I'm getting old out here!"_

_ "It's true; I can see her aging!" the Doctor piped up. There was the sound of a slap and the Doctor fell silent, his hand on his cheek._

_ "Ow!"_

_ "You really need to learn when to shut up."_

_ "I didn't—I was just agreeing with you!"_

_ "You'll learn," Rory muttered, walking towards the Tardis. Amy ran out of the back door, happily clothed in a green sundress and a hat, her feet bare._

_ "You do realize that we have an enormous wardrobe in the Tardis, right?" the Doctor asked, and River elbowed him._

_ "Ow!"_

_ "Be nice to my mother."_

_ Amy swatted her daughter gently, _

_ "Don't abuse the Doctor."_

_ River smiled a little too sweetly and gave her mother a peck on the cheek._

_ "Do you want to help me pack the picnic basket?"_

_ "All right." They headed off to the kitchen with little fuss._

_ The Doctor turned to Rory,_

_ "Is it just me, or did they leave a little too quietly?"_

_ Rory nodded, looking equally suspicious._

_ "They're plotting something, aren't they?"_

_ "Probably," the Doctor agreed, piloting the Tardis to Paris, France, Earth, approximately the 21__st__ century. Rory sat back in one of the chairs._

_ "So how're you doing, being her Dad and all that?"_

_ "It's interesting…" Rory answered honestly, "Because I know who she's going to grow up to be…and I see River in her sometimes, but right now she's just a sweet little girl whose favorite color is blue and who builds blanket-forts in the living room after dinner."_

_ "Is she interested in archaeology yet?"_

_ "You should see her bedroom recently. Dinosaurs everywhere; it's her new favorite thing. But she wants to be a princess when she grows up."_

_ The Doctor smiled. Rory knew his daughter so well; few working fathers could claim to know everything there was to know about their children._

_ "And how's Amy doing with all of it?"_

_ "She's good with Melody, and she likes her job."_

_ "Her job?"_

_ "Jack Harkness calls from Cardiff now and again to ask for consultations and advice. And she's an assistant-writer for a science fiction program on the telly."_

_ "Good for her," the Doctor said with a smile._

_ "River loves that show," Rory remarked. "She liked to point out all the science mistakes they make."_

_ "How's school for her?"_

_ "Private school; she gets to be with girls her own age and she still gets all the advanced tutoring she needs without sticking out. She's terribly clever, you know."_

_ "I know," the Doctor muttered. "Believe me, I know how clever little humans are, and little Time Lords are infinitely cleverer, so the combination must be hard to manage."_

_ "She really hates us telling her what to do without explaining why. It's always why why why with her."_

_ He laughed, nodding._

_ "How've you managed that, then?" _

_ "Amy told her that she has to listen to us. And at the end of the day she can ask us why and we'll explain, but at the moment, it's very important to listen."_

_ "And?"_

_ "She wasn't entirely happy with it, but it's been working for a few months now."_

_ He landed the Tardis on the lawn in front of the Eiffel tower. It was sunny outside._

_ "Well you've done a wonderful job with her Rory; you two raised a good woman."_

_ Rory smiled, _

_ "And don't you forget it."_

_ "As if she'd let me."_

_ Amy and River emerged from the kitchen, one bearing a picnic basket and the other a blanket. Both were grinning smugly and the Doctor and Rory exchanged glances, both of them equally concerned about what the girls were planning. The Doctor was simultaneously wondering if he'd get slapped or stabbed after they revealed that he'd impregnated their daughter…a feat thought impossible due to their genetics. And yet here they were. Apparently human-plus-Time Lord had just enough Time Lord DNA to make the process work; River's fall into the time stream had apparently revved up her Time Lord genes and well…here they were. Him, River, their unborn child, and Amy and Rory…all in Paris…for a picnic…which he hoped to survive with as little bodily damage as possible._

_ "Out we go then?" Amy asked, feet still bare, sundress swishing around her calves. River had changed into a similar dress, only in blue. The Doctor knew for a solid fact that she had at least one holster underneath that skirt. Maybe two. Rassilon, he loved his wife._

_ They sauntered out of the Tardis, girls in front with the boys trailing behind apprehensively. The Doctor could practically smell the mischief in the air. They were planning something and they weren't telling him or Rory. This would either go really well or cataclysmically badly. He was hoping for the former but expecting the latter._

_ Amy laid out the blanket and River began setting out the picnic things. Amy kept shooting little happy glances at her daughter and the Doctor closed his eyes and concentrated for a moment, reaching out to brush River's mind. She felt it and looked over at him, inquisitive._

_ "You told her, didn't you?" He asked in Gallifreyan, speaking slowly and enunciating so that she would understand. She was much better with written Gallifreyan than with spoken. _

_ River blushed a little and looked away for a moment, shaking her head._

_ "She guessed."_

_ "How did she do that?"_

_ "Oy!" Amy bellowed, momentarily reminding him of Donna. "You're being rude. Speak English."_

_ "Sorry," the Doctor muttered, and they all sat down._

_ "So, why the random picnic?" Amy asked._

_ "What, I'm not allowed to pop by and take you to lunch? Aren't we family now?"_

_ Amy leaned in, ginger hair falling into her face._

_ "When was the last time you popped in without a reason?"_

_ "See…I'm not sure if you've done this yet. How old is Melody right now?"_

_ "Five," Amy replied._

_ "Five-and-a-half," Rory corrected._

_ "Oh you're as bad as she is," Amy returned with a half-smile. She patted River's knee. "No offense, dear."_

_ "None taken."_

_ "Well you'll recall that I've popped by several times this year for no reason, just to see her."_

_ Amy wrinkled her forehead. "Okay, you're right. But still, you generally don't just whisk us off places with no notice and for no reason."_

_ "Explain travelling with me for those years before River was born…and all the times afterwards," the Doctor protested. _

_ "All right fine, you're right about that too. Happy?"_

_ The Doctor shrugged. "I'm right, of course I'm happy."_

_ "Anyway," River said loudly, passing sandwiches around. "The Doctor and I wanted to tell you something."_

_ "Now?" the Doctor protested. "We haven't even eaten yet! I want to survive my sandwich, thanks."_

_ "Don't be such a baby," River said, shoving him gently. "Mum already knows anyhow and you're not dead yet."_

_ "I'm saving my energy," Amy said, taking a bite of her sandwich._

_ "Could someone PLEASE tell me what is going on?" Rory demanded, ignoring his lunch in favor of glaring around the blanket._

_ "Dad," River said carefully, "I'm pregnant."_

_ Rory went rather white and blinked at his daughter, then at the Doctor, and then looked over to his wife._

_ "But…how? You said that the two of you couldn't have children. That you were too different genetically."_

_ "Well, turns out I was wrong," the Doctor said in a falsely calm and mildly suave manner._

_ "So you can have children," Rory stated._

_ "Well she's pregnant Rory; I think that it's evidence enough for us."_

_ "I'm going to be a grandfather?" Rory asked in a voice that cracked._

_ "Well if it makes you feel any better, your daughter's in her twenties so…you're really more around forty as a grandfather, not…however old you are now. _

_ "Twenty-eight," Rory said._

_ "Okay so if Melody is five, then you'll be in your fifties as a granddad. It's all very timey-wimey."_

_ "Who's your OBGYN?" Rory demanded. "You know how important it is for you to have a good doctor, Melody—I mean River."_

_ "I have a great Doctor," River smiled, kissing her husband's cheek. "And my OBGYN is Grandma."_

_ "Oh," Rory looked relieved. "Well that's all right then."_

_ "So…you're not mad?" the Doctor asked hesitantly._

_ "Well…on one hand, you've been having sex with my daughter. On the other hand, I know she was devastated when she found out that you two couldn't have children, so she's happier now. Anyway, I think I ought to do this out of principal." Rory considered for a moment, "Yeah, I think this is what you're supposed to do."_

_ So he hauled himself up and punched the Doctor in the jaw. The Time Lord fell back, looking astonished as Rory calmly wiped his hand on his trousers._

_ "Rory!" cried Amy, upset._

_ "Da-aad!" River shouted._

_ The Doctor sat up, rubbing his jaw bone._

_ "So that's where she got her right hook; I could have sworn it was going to come from Amy."_

_ "You punched my husband!" River exclaimed, glaring at her father._

_ "I'm actually pretty sure it was justified. That's what you're supposed to do if someone gets your daughter pregnant."_

_ "Only if they're not married, Daddy!" River wailed._

_ "No harm done anyhow, right Doctor?" Rory asked, and the Doctor rubbed his face for a moment and then shook Rory's outstretched hand._

_ "I was actually expecting a lot worse."_

_ "See then? No harm done." And Rory calmly began tucking into his sandwich._

XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX

"Blood's thicker than diesel fuel, right?" the Doctor muttered to Rory, whom was still standing in the kitchen, remembering the lunch in Paris when they had been told that his daughter was pregnant.

He chuckled.

"Water, Doctor. Blood is thicker than water."

"Oh…" the Doctor paused, "That expression doesn't make any more sense that way than it does my way."

Rory shrugged.

"I suppose I ought to get Amy up and send Melody to her grandparents' house?"

"Doesn't she have school?"

"No, she's on spring holiday. And she hasn't been to my parents' house in nearly two weeks; they must miss her by now."

"Why hasn't she run down the street?"

"Mum's been working on some project and I dunno what Dad's been doing."

The Doctor nodded.

"Do you want me to walk her over?"

Rory shrugged,

"Yeah, sure. Are we going somewhere?"  
>"Yeah," the Doctor replied. "We are. And you might want to pack your Centurion costume. I'll explain on the way."<p>

He popped back into the Tardis.

"I'm taking Melody to Tom and Sophie's. Your parents'll be in soon, but don't tell them what's going on yet, all right? I want to tell them together."

River nodded and busied herself by writing in her blue diary, the soft peachy-colored baby diary on the seat next to her.

"Back in a jiff, love." He gave her a peck on the cheek and closed the door to the Tardis, right in time to find Melody Pond holding aloft a drawing of her family, which included the Doctor and the Tardis.

"The teacher at school says I have quite the imagination. Is that true?"

"Well I think so, but I'm not in your imagination."

"Yeah, but Mummy explained that we're not meant to tell people about you because they wouldn't understand."

"That's true too. We're going to Tom and Sophie's house and I'm borrowing your Mummy and Daddy for a little while. Is that okay?"

"Why can't I come too?" Six-year-old Melody whined.

He smiled back at her.

"Spoilers."

She laughed and handed him her drawing. "I want to put this on grandpa's fridge."

"Sounds like a plan, Melody Pond."

She kissed her father goodbye, and then dashed upstairs to kiss her mother before returning to him.

"I'm ready to go now!"

"Allons-y, then!"

They walked down the street and Melody chattered about school and her friends and what she wanted to be when she grew up (a lion-tamer) and what she really wanted for her birthday (a ride in the Tardis to meet a real live bear) and who her best friend was at school (because the Doctor wasn't her school-friend.) As he knocked on her grandparents' door, Melody looked up at him with River's eyes and said in a way only a six-year-old can,

"You have to bring them back just as they were, okay? Not broken."

The Doctor nodded,

"I promise."

He kissed the top of her head and wondered if his child would be anything like little Melody Pond. Tom opened the door and the Doctor beamed at him.

"Hello, Tom. Just here to drop of Melody."

The older man smiled and took Melody by the hand.

"When will you lot be back to pick her up?"

"Probably tomorrow. Maybe the day after. Amy'll call."

"All right."

The door closed and he walked back to his Tardis, feeling a flutter of apprehension in his stomach. He wasn't sure if he could bring back the Ponds undamaged. And the thought terrified him.

**Okay I know that I haven't explained how Rory and Amy in the roughly present day (give or take 5 years) can live down the street from Rory's grandparents, whom apparently live in the future, where little Melody Pond had a hoverboard and played futuristic games. So I'm going to say…PORTAL! The Doctor installed a portal on the Williams' back door which is like a back-in-time teleportation thingy that goes to another house Amy and Rory's street in the (rough) present. Those of you shaking your heads at me, DEAL WITH IT. I'm trying to stay vaguely canon without re-writing so there. Let's see YOU do it. (Actually don't. Half of this is BBC's and storylines and future baby are all MINE. Do not steal or I'll set something with large teeth on you.)**


	24. Queen's Gambit

Queen's Gambit

When he returned, Rory was leaning against the outside of the Tardis, his face a little pale.

"She's pregnant," he remarked.

"You already knew that."

"Well yeah, but now she actually looks pregnant. She has a belly and everything…it's just weird."

"She's got hormone imbalances like you wouldn't believe."

"Sounds a bit like Amy around the end of the month."

"Yeah, except I've had weeks of it."

"Sorry, mate. I know she's a handful."

"Yeah, but I love her," the Doctor replied with a sigh.

"Great as all this is, Doctor, what's this about? Why are you here?"

"Rory the Roman, getting straight to the point."

"Doctor, you don't just pop in and ask for our help. If anything, you try to keep us away from danger."

"Do you remember when Melody was born and Madame Kovarian took her?"

"It's not exactly something you forget."

"We were with your parents…I think in their future…and we went to a museum. When we were there, this robot that someone had made using a human body came after River. And she said something about wanting our baby; about wanting the child of a Time Lord."

"Who sent it?"

"I think it was the Krillitanes, you've never met them. But the point is, River thinks that she's coming along with me and it'll be a battle. But I don't like to work that way if I can help it. So I need your help, yours and Amy's."

"To do what?"

"I want to…trick River. I want to send her somewhere with the two of you, looking like you're off on a mission. Only it'll be somewhere safe, where they can't get to her."

"So why do you need us? And why do I need the Centurion costume?"

"Because that's what she associates with you going into battle. And I need her to believe that you're actually going to be in danger. She won't believe it if I let her and the baby into danger, but if you're there protecting her, then it'll be believable."

"What about Amy?"

"She'll come with me; I'll drop her right back off here, or anywhere you like."

"Does she know about this yet?"

"No. She and River are too similar, too good at working out what each other are thinking. If I tell Amy, I tell River, even if it's not on purpose."

"So why tell me?"

"Because you're her father, because you waited two thousand years for Amy, because you'll never ever stop. Because you're one of my best friends and I trust you, Rory the Roman."

Rory nodded,

"Amy's already in the Tardis. How are you going to do this?"

"Get her to talk about the baby; ask to see the books she has on it. Appeal to her inner Melody Pond. You're clever, Rory. Work something out."

Rory nodded again,

"You'll keep her safe?"

"She's going to hate me for it, but yes."

The Doctor put on his best confident grin and pushed open the door to the Tardis.

"Honey, I'm home!"

River laughed and looked over as her husband and her father walked in the door.

"What were you boys talking about?" Amy asked.

He lied smoothly and easily.

"Oh the usual things; pregnant daughter, death threats, reminder that he has a sword."

"Dad!" River scolded, "Play nice!"

Rory didn't have to fake being protective of his daughter.

"Making sure he's treating you right."

"You're as bad as Grandpa!"

"Don't you say that," he told her, making a face. "I am not like my father."

"You really are though," Amy remarked. Rory glared at her for a moment, and then allowed his gaze to settle on River's stomach.

"So…you're actually pregnant."

"Yeah," she laughed, "But you already knew that. Mum said you did the family picnic about a year ago. Sorry it's all muddled. I'm twenty-one weeks along now."

He nodded.

"So how do you know what to expect? I mean that baby's half Time Lord, right?"

"I've got books."

"Really? Like medical books?" Rory didn't have to feign interest.

"Yeah, but maybe another time, Dad. There's something that the Doctor needs to tell you."

The Doctor shook his head at her.

"Ten minutes won't make a difference, River. I'll get us into the vortex and we can talk about it in a bit."

She looked at him, questioning. He could feel her trying to see what he was thinking, trying to tap into that little bit of Time Lord in her. He was too clever for that and she wasn't Time Lord enough for blocking her to be an effort. In Gallifreyan he said,

"Let them have a few minutes of happiness before we burst the bubble."

Nodding, River smiled at her parents,

"Books are in the library, come on."

The Doctor waited until they were gone to dematerialize, but he didn't park in the vortex. Without halting, he landed them on an uninhabited planet. It was peaceful, green. He ran every check, every scan, making sure that there were no life forms on this planet. Nothing except plants and deer-like creatures called the Faari. In another billion years, they would evolve into sentient life forms, but now they were merely grazers. They didn't even have natural predators. He checked the timelines, checked anything that could happen, anything that could go wrong. He was far back enough that nobody was due to 'discover' this planet for another billion and a half years. Sighing with relief, he ran his hands over the console.

"The viewscreen, Sexy."

The screen showed empty space, stars peacefully twinkling.

"And you know that we're going to come back to this exact spot after I make a quick stop in Cardiff. We have to land here, Sexy. Here and now. I can't let her get hurt. I can't lose my family again."

The time machine hummed, lights dimming and then brightening again. He rubbed the console with one hand,

"Thank you."

"Talking to her again, sweetie?"

River was smiling as she walked into the console room with her parents. Amy was squealing over the picture from River's scans, the most recent picture of their baby.

"Look at her little hands!"

"We don't know it's a her," the Doctor pointed out.

"If she says she knows, she knows," Amy defended her daughter. "Now Doctor, why are we here?"

"River and I need your help," the Doctor said, walking over to hug his wife from behind.

"Okay," Amy agreed instantly. "With what?"

"Someone wants our baby. And we need your help making sure that they never get it."

Amy's eyes burned with a fierce light, recalling their quest to get baby Melody back. There was nothing in the universe that could make her forget that, and nothing in the universe could stop her from making sure that her daughter never had to suffer that same grief.

"What do you need us to do?"

The Doctor smiled, his pre-thought response already on his lips. He allowed himself to ramble, knowing it would make him sound more natural. It had never been more important to fool River.

"I have a thing. Well, it's sort of a plan. Well, it's more of a plan-thing. Thing being a plan-like thing that's not quite finished yet, but the kinks are being worked out. It's like getting a neck massage, really. All the issue-kinks are being worked out of my neck-plan…thus the thing. Wait…am I the masseuse in that situation? Because if my neck is also the plan…then I'm massaging my own neck…well that's not going to go well…"

He paused for a moment, thinking it over.

"All right, let's say experience is the masseuse in this situation…and I'm the neck, which is also the plan…"

He paused again, trying to think.

"Never mind, it's a rubbish example. Anyhow, here's what's going on—the short version mind you. The long version involved a lot of sneaking around, and a good deal of death, and possibly the worst tuna-salad sandwich I've ever eaten. Let's skip that bit; it was a really awful sandwich."

Amy raised an eyebrow, waiting expectantly while River concealed a smirk. Good, she was amused which meant she was with him which meant she believed him.

"Anyhow, the point is there was a bunch of aliens who didn't particularly like the rest of their kind. They sort of take traits from other species to build themselves into a better species. Only these particular Krillitanes didn't much like the idea of doing that any old way. See, they did it originally to create genetic variety, and to keep the gene pool fresh, but they all went mean. And these particular Krillitanes wanted to create a sort of master-race, literally build themselves into a perfect genetic race. Think Nazis, but alien. And for some reason, this particular group of Krillitanes, they were calling themselves the Praei last time I met them, also wanted to kill any race that wasn't being added to their gene pool. Very Dalek-y of them, to be frank. So I stopped them and kept them from travelling or from absorbing any more race traits; you know, let them really embrace what it feels like to grow and change without stealing that from someone else. And apparently they took it badly and for some reason or another want our baby. I don't know whether it's for the power it'll have—because regeneration releases an absurd amount of energy—or for the Time Lord genes. Either way it's bad and it has to stop."

"So, what's the plan?" Amy asked.

"Well first of all, we've got to throw them off, haven't we? So we need to take care of the robot's body. She was a human and I don't know who, but she belonged to someone once. And I think that we ought to give her a proper burial."

"Can you tell when she's from? Because the Krillitanes are ten thousand years back, aren't they? They'd need some sort of time-travel device to get her to where we were, in the future," River pointed out.

"See, that's the problem; she could be from anywhere."

He thought for a moment,

"I know who could find her, if anyone could."

"Who's that then?" Amy asked, and the Doctor gave a grimacing sort of smile,

"Captain Jack Harkness."

XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX

"Doctor!" Jack exclaimed as the Time Lord sauntered into Torchwood, ignoring all the security systems in favor of just showing off. He spotted the Ponds behind the Doctor.

"And who might these lovely people be?"

"Rory and Amy Pond, now stop that."

"Stop what?" Jack replied, kissing both of them on the cheeks.

"Don't even start with me today, Jack. I'm here for a favor."

"All right, let's hear—who is this?"

River smiled, "River Song, archaeologist."

"Hello there River Song, archaeologist. And how may I help you today?"

"Oy!" Both the Doctor and Rory managed to shout at the same time.

"What?"

"That's my wife!" the Doctor growled.

"And my daughter," Rory chimed in.

Jack looked at the group, confused.

"Time travel?"

"Yeah," Amy replied. "We're great fun at family reunions."

"Oh I bet you are," Jack purred and Rory gave him a fierce glare. The Doctor interrupted the probable confrontation by grabbing Jack's shoulder and turning him around so they were facing each other.

"Favor? Remember that?"

Jack winked at River,

"He gets ever-so-jealous."

She smiled back, looking very like the cast whom had gotten the canary.

"Oh trust me," she purred, "I know."

Jack smiled at her, "We'll really have to have lunch sometime."

She smiled back, "We already have."

He nodded, "Time travel."

She smiled and pointed at her husband, who seemed more than uncomfortable that she was currently pregnant and still flirting with Jack. He was the only one allowed to do that…flirt with River that was. Jack flirted with him enough as it was; it was actually a bit ridiculous at times.

"I need you to find someone…someone dead."

Jack raised an eyebrow,

"Am I allowed to ask why?"

"It makes no difference to you; the Earth isn't in danger."

"But you are?"

"My child is."

"Ah, so you're the baby-daddy. And here I was thinking that you stayed locked up in your Tardis all night long."

River chuckled and winked at Jack, mouthing 'oh we do' at him from behind her parents. He grinned.

"So who needs finding?"

The Doctor had sewn up the woman's body with great care and placed her in a body bag. It was this bag that he carried out of the Tardis now, setting it on the floor. He unzipped it and allowed Jack to see her face.

"This woman."

"Why can't you use the Tardis to find her?"

"Because they'll know we're looking."

He gave Toshiko's computer a sonic boost, warning her,

"It's only for the afternoon. No cheats, no peeks, no spoilers."

She nodded, a little intimidated by this man whom even Jack obeyed. She searched, using her picture, a DNA sample, her age (acquired by a scan of various parts of her compared to standard human development) and a description (to be used in times before photographs). For a few hours this afternoon, Tosh's computer could look anywhere in time and space.

It took her three hours to find the woman, but they did. She was from 1991and her name was Kelly Franklin. She was from Wales.

"Good old Wales," Jack said sadly, reading the 'Missing Persons' report. "Seems she had a little brother, who was six when she disappeared; she was looking after him. Poor boy had to go into foster care."

"So that'd make him…sixteen now, yeah?" Rory asked.

Jack nodded and the Doctor looked at him,

"Look in on him, would you? See if there's anything you can do. If you can help him at all…"

"Understood," Jack told him. "We'll see he's being properly looked after. What's his name?"

"Jeffrey," Tosh read out loud. "Jeffrey Albert Franklin."

The Doctor's face lit up momentarily, but he contained his glee, taking the 'super-settings' off of Toshiko's computer.

"Thanks, Jack. I owe you one."

Jack eyed River,

"And I can collect it at any time?"

The Doctor scowled, but River smiled, sauntered over to Jack, and leaned in closely to his face. The Time Lord's fists clenched, but he trusted River.

"What sort of collection are we talking?" she whispered. Rory seemed to be having some trouble managing the scene as well.

He winked at her,

"You've just given it to me; thank you River Song, archaeologist."

She smiled and walked over to her husband, grabbing a hold of his braces.

"Dad, close your eyes for a moment."

Rory nodded, resigned, and obeyed his daughter's request.

Smiling tauntingly, River kissed the Doctor thoroughly, running her hands over his chest. He made a little humming noise in the back of his throat, half-pleasure, half-amusement. Once she had finished, River smiled at Jack.

"We'll be off then."

"What about Kelly?" Jack asked and the Doctor's face sobered, the lovesick grin sliding from his face.

"I've taken out all the alien technology. Just…have her discovered, all right? It'll do Jeffrey good to not keep waiting and being disappointed."

Jack nodded,

"Will do. Until next time, then?"

"Until next time," the Doctor agreed.

As they closed the door to the Tardis, River asked,

"Who's Jeffrey Franklin?"

The Doctor smiled,

"In about seventy years, he's going to cure cancer. He said his motivation came from losing his sister, and wanting to make the most of her memory."

"Time works everything out, doesn't it?"  
><em>Except for your death<em>, he thought, but he couldn't say it aloud.

"I suppose it does," he replied.

"What's next on the plan-list?" Amy asked.

"Well, I kept all of their technology and I want to throw them off. So we'll take that to another planet and bury it. And once that's done, the real work begins."

"Why do we have to bury their technology?"

"The signal had been transmitting all this time; they probably still think I'm trying to work this thing out. Once the transmitter stops transmitting, they'll know I'm coming for them. And they'll be getting themselves ready. Only no one's ever really ready for me."

And he pulled the lever, transporting the Tardis to a meadow-planet that he had landed on not hours before. He ran a gentle hand over the console and smiled.

"All right then," he declared, "Let's get our shovels!"


	25. The Central Pawns

The Central Pawns

**I wrote a good bit of the last chapter at an absurd hour of the night. Kelly Franklin was from 2001, not 1991. Her brother Jeffery was six THEN, because if he'd been 6 in 1991, in 2011 he'd be TWENTY SIX, not sixteen. Sorry for the mathematical error…it was like 1AM at the time.**

**Special kudos to Morzan's Elvish Daughter for noticing that the title of the last chapter was a chess reference; good job!**

Rory did most of the digging. The Doctor, though he began by enthusiastically digging, wasn't very good at organized digging. He was like a kid trying to dig through to China—energetic, but not really realistic about the outcome of his digging. Also, he managed to stick the shovel through his shoe and bruise his toes. Despite her concern, River laughed her head off as he hopped about on one foot while shouting,

"Ow! Ow! Ow! Ow! Ow! Ow!"

"Sweetie, you're scaring the wildlife."

"But my _toes_, River!"

"Well go get some ice for your toes then..._quietly_."

Pouting, the Doctor stomped loudly and gingerly back to the Tardis, slamming the door to make his point. River rolled her eyes as Rory tossed the bag of alien technology into the hole and began to shovel dirt onto it.

"Wait!" River cried, and she reached down and opened the bag of parts, digging through it. "The transmitter's not in here, and that was the whole point of—oh no." She dropped the bag.

The Tardis began to dematerialize; Amy shouted in alarm and River ran up to it, trying to bang on the doors, demand to be let in. But the machine vanished, leaving her beating at empty air. Rory stood silently, watching it go before he dropped the bag of parts back into the hole and finished shoveling dirt over top of it, effectively burying the evidence.

River stood defiantly, shouting up at the sky, swearing in a dozen languages. Once her fury was spent, she dropped to her knees, sitting on her feet, one hand resting in the soft green grass.

"Come back," she whispered. "Come back you daft old man." She cried then, and hated herself for crying and hated the Doctor for making her and hated the Krillitanes for making him run off and do something dangerous to protect her.

"I hate you!" she shouted at the sky, and then dissolved into sobs. Amy rushed over to her daughter. Even as a child, River rarely cried. So as only a mother could, Amelia Pond wrapped her arms around her daughter and rocked back and forth, back and forth, until the sobs slowed and the tears stopped flowing.

Ashamed and hurt, River stood and turned to her father. Her voice low and angry, she looked at him accusingly.

"You knew."

Rory nodded once, accepting her anger. He had expected it.

"You knew and you let him do it anyways?" Her voice shook a little, just enough for him to wonder if he had done the right thing. But as soon as the doubt was there, it was banished. She was safe, and the Doctor had wanted her safe. That was all that mattered.

"Yes. He did this on purpose, River. He didn't want you and the baby in danger and he knew that you'd never stay behind if he asked you."

"Damn right I wouldn't! He's the Doctor! Someone needs to look after him! And he gets reckless when he's emotional, Daddy!" she slipped; she hadn't meant to call him 'Daddy'. She hadn't meant to sound like a little girl who needed comforting. But she did.

"Who's going to look after him? What if he gets killed and it's _all_ _my_ fault?"

Tears burned at her eyes, but she was not going to cry again. She had already cried enough and it had done her no good; it was time for another strategy. It was time for her to think her way out of this and to get back to the Doctor. Glowering at her father, River seized the shovel and began to dig.

XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX

The Doctor watched her beat at the Tardis for a few seconds, and then the Tardis was gone and so was her image. He sighed, half-relieved and half-upset. She was never going to forgive him for this. Shoving that thought aside, he patted the Tardis,

"All right, Sexy. Let's get on with this."

The Doctor, despite the fact that he felt bad about tricking River, went along with his plan. He _was_ the cleverest man in the universe, after all. It involved a bit of investigating, first. He set in the Praei moon's coordinates into the console and pulled a lever, causing the Tardis to lurch out of the vortex. He even put on the silencers so it wouldn't make any noise as he landed. After retrieving one of the perception-filters on a key-necklace, a tin lunchbox with smurfs on it, and his trust (fully-charged) sonic screwdriver, the Doctor patted the Tardis console, slipped on his necklace, and stepped out of his blue box.

The room he walked into was all silver and white—a lab then. Unshatterable beakers were on little stands and in clear cylindrical tanks swam…something. The tanks were all around the room, built into the walls and some in between lab tables. The Doctor took out his sonic screwdriver and scanned the tank up and down, up and down. After taking readings, the Doctor looked at them and stepped back in shock. Not sure he believed them, he ran to the next tank, scanning it. Still in shock he scanned another tank, and another…and another…he ran about the room, scanning each tank. All but one had a little…something…inside of it.

"Oh you poor things," the Doctor murmured, "Taken from your mothers' wombs before you wanted to go. But I promise you, I'll get you back where you belong. I promise."

Every single tank had a fetus in it.

XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX

River paced back and forth on the grass while her parents sat to one side, watching her. She silently inventoried all the parts she had, and then tried to work out how she could cobble them together. Ignoring the fact that she was currently really angry at her father and the Doctor, she turned to her parents.

"What have you got in your pockets?"

Amy pulled out her phone, but kept it in her hand, unwilling to give it up.

"Rory's parents have this number; I want Melody to be able to reach us if there's anything wrong."

"Mum, if there's anything wrong, there's nothing that you can do about it. We're stuck here."

Amy frowned, but slowly handed her daughter the phone. Rory, however, emptied out his wallet, keys, and work pager without any fuss.

"Mum, are you wearing an underwire bra?"

Amy started, looking confused,

"Yeah, why?"

"I'm going to need it."

"You're going to need my _bra_?"

"Just the wire," River said dismissively. "I'm not wearing an underwire right now, so we can't use mine. Dad, I'll need your shoelaces."

"River, the Doctor left you here to keep you safe," Rory began calmly, "And he'll be back to get us any minute now, just you wait."

"Yeah, but his timing has been off a dozen times before and I'm not taking the chance of us waiting here for a month or of him getting killed. Do you want me to be a single mother?"

Rory sighed and began unlacing his shoes as River pulled her laser pistol from its holster and her plasma blaster from another. She pooled her tools, then examined the pile of parts.

"I don't suppose either of you have a screwdriver?"

XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX

The Doctor exited the lab after determining that the babies hadn't been harmed or altered, that they were merely there for now. He began attempting to piece together their plan as he navigated the corridors of the Praei compound. He went through what he knew:

Krillitanes conquered planets to obtain traits from them. The Praei couldn't do that because he stopped them. The Praei weren't happy with him because he stopped them. They now had fetuses in tanks in a variety of species that they considered 'elite.' There was an empty tank in the lab. The babies hadn't been tampered with yet. There had been a large casket of Krillitane oil in the corner, not blocked off or in any way indicated that it was dangerous. He didn't know the layout of the building he was in.

After going through what he knew, he went through what he could guess or deduce:

The Krillitane oil probably wasn't harmful to them anymore due to the fact that it wasn't indicated as dangerous. The empty tank was probably meant to house his child. The Praei had gotten this technology from somewhere, meaning that they'd developed a lot in the past hundred years or so. Due to the fact that they wanted his baby, they were probably still ticked at him for shutting down their (completely awful) way of life.

Taking all of the information he had and supposed, he then went through of what he didn't know:

He didn't know why the Praei wanted his and River's baby, other than because it was a Time Lord child. He didn't know where the babies' mothers were. He didn't know what their plan was. He didn't know exactly how he was going to stop them.

Excellent. With the informational inventory taken, he knew exactly where he stood. That figured out, he wandered through the halls until he found the central location and the front doors. The whole place seemed deserted…where WAS everyone? The transmitter couldn't have alerted them; he'd fed it to a recycler-bot on Chrissiline Five not half an hour ago. The bot wouldn't have even crushed it yet. The lab's lights had been on…but only the lab's lights. None of the others had been on.

He walked over to the console at the front desk, pointing his sonic screwdriver at it. It blinked on and the Doctor set down his smurfs-themed lunchbox on the desk and began scanning through the system, trying to work out where everyone was.

"Contaminant-breach," he muttered to himself. "All the environment checks came out all right; surely there's a mistake. There's nothing toxic in the air."

"That's because it was a clever ruse," said a voice behind him. The Doctor turned around to face a creature holding a gun.

"Fabulous!" he exclaimed happily, "I've been looking for someone. Take me to your leader and all that." He picked up his lunch box and the Krillitane pointed the gun at him,

"No treachery," it growled.

"Treachery?" the Doctor replied, aghast, "It's my box lunch!" He opened the lunch box to reveal a chicken sandwich, apple, bit of salad, and a bottle of Snapple.

"See? Not dangerous, just food."

The Krillitane scowled and motioned with his gun.

"Move."

"All right, you don't have to be pushy about it."

Closing up his lunch, the Doctor began to walk, the Krillitane with the gun behind him.

XXXXXXXXXXXXXXX

River welded with her laser pistol in the same way that would one day inscribe 'hello sweetie' on a home box. She had already tried calling the Tardis—the Doctor didn't pick up, of course. Rory and Amy looked on as their brilliant daughter constructed…something…out of the robot's parts.

"River, what are you making?" Amy asked.

"Psychic transmitting amplifier," River replied calmly, carefully melting the end of the wire from her mother's bra and connecting it to a bunch of the wires from the woman's brain nodes.

"And is that safe?" Rory asked.

River had abandoned her anger at her father for the moment to focus on her project—getting them off of this planet and back to the Doctor.

"What do you mean by safe?" Her tone was mildly aggressive anyhow, but he ignored it.

"I mean if you use that thing, will it hurt you or us or anyone?"

"Provided that it doesn't explode when I turn it on, it should be perfectly safe."

"_Explode_?" Rory shouted, "River, you're pregnant. You can't just fiddle around with exploding things!"

"Dad, I'll be careful. I've done way more dangerous things than this."

"River, you're pregnant. You can't carry on doing reckless things; you've got to think about your baby! The Doctor wouldn't want you two in danger!"

"If he didn't want me in danger, he shouldn't have left me on a planet while he went recklessly off to try and save our baby. He ought to know better than to leave me behind worrying. And the fact that he hasn't come back isn't really a strong sign, is it? They might have him right now and he might be in danger and I can't do anything about it here."

Setting the last wire carefully into place, she picked up Amy's phone and backed up a few steps, letting the wire uncoil a bit so she had some distance between her and the machine. Crouching on the earth, she held down the power button of Amy's phone. Wires crackled and hummed and the screen lit up; it was working.

XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX

**WHAT. WILL. HAPPEN. NEXT?**

**If you wish to find out, keep reading. If you would prefer not to, go have yourself a nice coffee…and then come back anyway. Thanks very much to all of you reviewing—I've gotten over 200 of them now and I read every single one. They're a huge motivator for me. **

**(Also, I have another 11/River oneshot out: 'The Winning and the Losing Game.' Hope you enjoy it!)**


	26. Sizing Up Opponents

Sizing Up Opponents

"So what's your name?" the Doctor asked conversationally. He was, perhaps, the only man in the universe who could have an entirely cheery conversation with someone sticking a gun into his back. Then again, he was probably the only man in the universe above the age of nine who would voluntarily carry a smurf lunchbox. He was a man of many improbabilities, the Doctor.

"I am Sister Jarraa," the Krillitane growled. "Keep moving."

"Pleased to meet you, Sister Jarraa," the Doctor replied cheerily. "May I call you Sister?"

"No," she growled and prodded the Doctor's back with the gun again.

"All right, no need to be cross."

Jarraa steered him through the corridors of the building, leading him into a turbo-lift, where she hit an unlabeled button at the very top.

"An unlabeled button!" the Doctor exclaimed delightedly. "Oh I love an unlabeled button; so mysterious, so exciting. Why isn't it labeled?"

"It does not _require_ a label," the Krillitane growled, sounding annoyed.

"So everyone knows what it's for? What about guests? Or visitors? They won't know what the mysterious unlabelled button is for and then you have to give them a guide, which is really a drain on personnel. Still—love an unlabeled button, so mysterious. Love a mystery, me. And Agatha Christie! Oh Agatha, she was a sharp one, she was. I solved a mystery with her once. The culprit was a vespiform, or rather the love child of a human and a vespiform that drowned in a flood in India. Now that was an adventure—goodness, are we there yet? This is a really long elevator ride."

"It would be shorter if you _shut up_," Jarraa growled.

"Oh _well then_," the Doctor said, looking offended, "don't have to tell me twice. I can take a hint."

They rode in silence for about thirty seconds before the Doctor asked in a mildly interested fashion,

"What, no elevator music?"

The Krillitane hit him over the head with her gun and his knees gave out as the world went fuzzy, then black.

XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX

"It's working!" River shouted and Amy and Rory ran over to look at the mass of wires and parts.

"Wait, you said it's a psychic transmitter, right?" Amy asked.

"Yeah," River replied, handing her mother the cell phone. "Hold this." She walked over to where the plugs that went into the woman's brain had been woven and tied (using her father's shoelaces) to make a rough headband that looked more like an absurdly large hair elastic than anything else. Setting the thing on her head, she motioned for Amy to hand her the phone.

"So doesn't that mean you'll call anyone with psychic communication?"

"Well it could, but it also means that it's likely that the Doctor is going to get this on his psychic paper. And if he's as unreliable as usual, an earlier or later version of him is going to show up here and pick us up."

"And if it isn't the Doctor?" Rory asked.

"Do you have your sword?"

"No."

"Well I have a plasma blaster, a laser pistol, and a mildly cross Scottish mum. I think I'm set."

Rory opened his mouth to object, considered, and then nodded, knowing that he didn't have any defense that could really dispute her logic.

"How long will it take?" Amy asked and River smiled.

"Give me…oh two minutes."

Closing her eyes, River held the phone in front of her carefully. Amy and Rory stood to one side, sort of looking about as they waited. River's eyes opened as a sudden bright flash appeared a few feet from her, and then a smiling man.

"Jack?" River asked, surprised.

"River?" Jack Harkness asked. "_You_ sent that message? You naughty girl."

River smiled,

"It was meant for the Doctor."

"Well clearly. Look at this!" He showed her the psychic paper and River blushed after reading it.

"I might be a little rusty at conveying a single message. I blame the hormones."

"Well feel free to send me messages like this any time. Seriously. _Any time_."

"Is that a vortex manipulator?"

"Yup; the new model just came out. Nice, isn't it?"

"Have you got a ship?"

"Docked about a light-year and a good two billion years from here; the vortex manipulator seemed quicker and I _really_ didn't want to wait, if you catch my drift."

Rory cleared his throat loudly and Jack turned around and smiled.

"Amy! Rory! Look at the pair of you, haven't seen you since…oh it must have been a century ago."

"A century?" Rory asked, confused.

"He doesn't die properly," River explained. "It's a bit complicated."

"Well if we all join hands, I can get us out of here."

"Jack, I'm pregnant."

"Really? With which one?"

River's shock must have shown on her face, because Jack winced.

"I suppose I shouldn't have said that…spoilers."

"I was just asking which model this was. Anything before the six-million series isn't safe for pregnant women."

"Woman, you think I would travel using the measly six million? No, darling. I've got a fifteen million series, hot off the presses. Pretty little beauty, isn't it?"

River smiled,

"One, call me woman again and I'll shoot you in a really _really_ unpleasant location. Two, this model allows ride-alongs, right?"

"Point taken, and yes, ride alongs are welcome. Everyone grab on to everyone—group hug if you like."

"_Jack_," River warned, and he smiled, grabbing onto her hand.

"So _touchy_ when you're hormonal."

XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX

The Doctor woke up with a throbbing lump on the back of his head, still clutching his box lunch, on the floor of a very large room. He rubbed his head with one hand.

"_Ow_," he complained loudly.

"If it were anyone else, I'd apologize," a calm voice said, and the Doctor turned to face whoever was speaking. "But seeing as you ruined our way of life and frankly, annoyed the living daylights out of Sister Jarraa, I'll save the apology for someone I actually care about."

"Nice to meet you too," the Doctor replied, still rubbing his head. "And who might you be?"

"Grand Chancellor of the Praei."

"That's a title, not a name."

"So is 'the Doctor,'" the Grand Chancellor of the Praei replied.

"Well yeah, but it's not a mouthful, is it? 'Doctor' is nice and simple."

"You may address me as 'your grandness' if it pleases you," the Grand Chancellor of the Praei told him, running a hand over its bald head.

"Got anything shorter? GP maybe?"

"No, that will not do."

"Sure it will. GP, lovely name; nice and short. Easy to remember too…but just to be sure, you haven't got anything against the state of Louisiana, have you? I mean, I know it's GP but it's still a bit close for my taste."

The Grand Chancellor didn't respond to that.

"Right then, I did ask to be taken to the leader of the Praei and here you are. So, let's get on with it, shall we? Traditional speech rules; you say your bit, I say how I'm going to stop you, and then we go about our business."

"I'm not sure you understand your situation here, Doctor. You are not in control of this situation."

"Of course not, that'd be you, good old GP. But still, the speech thing is a bit of a staple in the battle of wills and I'm not really one for breaking tradition…well, I am really, but the speeches are always the fun bits and I like to keep the fun bits in; rounds everything out nicely."

"No Doctor, you don't seem to understand me."

"Well you're not making a speech, are you? It'd be a lot easier if you just got it off your chest. A good speech does that you know. Soliloquy and all that."

"This isn't a confrontation before battle, Doctor. This is a victory speech."

XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX

They vanished from the planet, (River taking the psychic amplifying transmitter with her) and landed on Jack's ship. The first thing River did was carefully remove the shoelaces, what was left of Amy's bra wire, and the cell phone, and hand them back to their respective owners. Amy's phone still appeared to work, but her bra wire was mangled and she handed it back to her daughter with a grimace as Rory re-laced his shoes.

"River, I really think you should keep this."

"It's your bra wire!"

"Really, just recycle it or something. I'm fine."

Jack turned at the mention of the bra, but River shot him a death glare, which he calmly ignored.

"Where'd you get the vortex-manipulator?" River asked casually and Jack grinned.

"Let's just say I liberated it."

River grinned wider and promptly shot him in the chest. Jack fell, stone dead.

"River!" Amy shrieked, "How could you?"

"Mum, it's really hard to explain and I haven't got time." She removed the vortex manipulator and strapped it to her own wrist, typing in the coordinates. "Grab my arm."

"River you _killed_ him!"

"Give him three…two…one."

Jack gasped and sat bolt upright, glaring at River.

"River Song, you give that back."

"Sorry Jack, but I promise to return it…probably."

Grabbing her parents' hands, she hit the button and they blinked out of existence. Jack sat on the floor of his ship, staring at the wreckage that was River's makeshift psychic amplifying transmitter and the spot where most of the Pond family had been standing. He shook his head, rubbing where River had shot him.

"So loose with a gun, that woman…and so _so_ sexy. Pity she's monogamous."

XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX

"What do you mean a victory speech?" the Doctor asked, looking around. "We haven't done anything yet."

"That, Doctor, is where you are wrong. You see, you locked us here on Carcipe, but our business associates, some of the last surviving members of the Slitheen family, broke the lock you put on our beloved moon. They don't particularly like you either, Doctor, but they're only really concerned with money and revenge. So we paid them generously for their technology and assistance. We killed them afterwards, of course, but it was necessary. And now, here you are. You're here to witness the revival of the Praei, the cleaning of the universe, the purification of our filthy race and our ascension to a higher form."

"Well see now? Wasn't that lovely?" He was smiling. "Didn't that feel nice, getting the speech off your chest? And no offense, GP, but that's not really a victory speech. And frankly, you could use an evil laugh. I'm not saying you _need_ one, but it's really that cherry on top that completes the piece, if you know what I'm saying. Just…think about it, okay? You can try it again later. Anyhow, now it's my turn, isn't it?"

"No Doctor, it is not your turn. You will wait in a holding cell until your wife arrives with your child. And then we will rip her open and take your child. With that child, we will combine the genes of the greatest races, finishing with the _Time Lord_, and we will take the universe by storm. The Praei will rule, and the Praei will shine, shine as the greatest age in history, in all of time!"

"See, that's where you're wrong," the Doctor said, his voice lowering. "Because she isn't coming. I left her well-protected somewhere and she can't get away. She can't come."

The Grand Chancellor smiled then, a merciless showing of jagged teeth. As he leaned into the light, the Doctor got a good look at him. He was slender and tall with two arms ending in delicate fingers with claws on the end. His head was large and bald with enormous slitted eyes and a large nose, his mouth small but containing dozens of jagged teeth. His skin was unbelievably pale and there were slits at his neck, closed but still visible—unused gills, the Doctor thought—the legs were long and muscled. He looked a bit cartoonish, the Doctor thought, but didn't say so.

"So little faith in your mate, Doctor. Surely you know that she will come? We've been watching a long while. She always comes."

"Not this time," the Doctor said quietly. "Because I made sure that she couldn't come."

"It seems a waiting game is in order, then," the Grand Chancellor of the Praei said with a chuckle. "And we shall see who is right."

The Doctor knew deep in his hearts that if there was any possible way that River could get to him, she would. But he had made sure that she couldn't get there, hadn't he? He'd taken away anything and everything that she could…but the spare parts. If he could build a Tardis from parts, could she build something to transport her off-world? Mentally, he went through everything that he had left behind. No, there wasn't a single item that she could use to make any sort of transporter. He had taken extra care that her vortex manipulator hadn't been on her either. No, she couldn't transport herself here. It gave him a grim sort of satisfaction.

"Holding cell A, if you please," the Grand Chancellor ordered and an extremely miffed-looking Jarraa grabbed him by the arm and bodily dragged him through several corridors and tossed him roughly into a cell. The Doctor looked up from the floor as Jarraa deadlock-sealed the door and then leered at him through the bars.

"I hope that you're extremely unhappy here," she growled.

"Oh come on, Jarraa!" the Doctor called after her as she walked away. "Remember all the good times we had!"

She was out of sight.

The Doctor sighed and sat cross-legged on the floor, eyeing his lunchbox.

"Well, I am rather hungry," he admitted to himself. "And saving the universe _is_ hungry work."

He opened the smurfs lunch box and stuck the apple in his pocket; he'd probably want a snack later. Happily, he munched on his sandwich, mentally planning out his escape. The door was deadlocked, but the bars were metal and the wall was concrete. He could resonate the concrete easily enough, so escape wasn't a problem. All he had to do was get back to the lab, put all the tanks into the Tardis (because it was fairly clear that the mothers didn't survive the extraction process; the Doctor mentally compared it to a reverse-abortion—mother dies in the extraction of the baby…it was actually a bit ironic, but that was beside the point) and then he had to work out how the Slitheen had unlocked this moon and fix it. The moon had to be re-locked down. It was clear that a century of solitude hadn't been enough to change the Praei ways. The thing was the youth; he needed to somehow alter the thinking of the youth so…a simple wipe and re-download would to the trick. He would merely need to erase all the Praei files on themselves and upload another program…which he could completely do. This wasn't going to be too much trouble at all…all right he was kidding himself. It would be a lot of trouble and a lot of work and a lot of running, but he'd done tougher things than this.

Smiling, he took a large bite of his sandwich and chewed thoughtfully. He loved adventures. Swallowing, he opened the bottle of Snapple and took a swig. After his drink, he looked on the underside of the cap; he loved the little Snapple facts. Only instead of a Snapple-fact, there were two little words.

_Hello Sweetie._

**Oh come now, you didn't see that coming as SOON as I mentioned the Snapple? (Okay I don't blame you at all if you didn't.) Also, anyone objecting to the mild remark on abortion, it's not an attempt to politically influence anyone; I just noticed parallels there and decided to write it in. It's not like I said anything supporting or ridiculing it. Any ridiculous comments pertaining to my remark WILL BE deleted. **

**Thanks for reading! **


	27. Actually I'm Rubbish at Chess Shocks

Actually, I'm Rubbish at Chess

The Doctor stared at the Snapple cap for a good fifteen seconds before he swore in Gallifreyan, re-packed his lunchbox, and pulled out his sonic screwdriver. After he resonated the concrete enough for him to push a Doctor-sized hole through, he climbed out and examined the perception filter key that was supposed to keep others from seeing him. Though to be fair, he thought to himself, he had left clues the first time and had been escorted the second time; he had drawn attention to himself. Maybe the thing still worked…he didn't know. Pressing the key to his mouth for luck, he muttered,

"Damn that woman," and began walking as quickly as he could down the hall. He didn't run, didn't attract attention to himself, merely moved with silent rapidity through the shadows of the corridors and back towards the lab.

The lights in the lab were on, and it was no longer empty. Biting his lower lip, the Doctor thought, his mind racing. Something had to be done to clear the room and it had to be done soon. He didn't know where or when River would show up and she had no idea what was going on. Sliding along the walls, he slipped into the Tardis, still parked in the corner of the lab.

"Perception filters," the Doctor muttered, digging through a storage space under the grating of the floor. "Gotta love those."

He pulled out a contraption, a large and woefully outdated-looking PC from perhaps the early 1990s, when computers first came out for individual homes. He could practically hear River's scorn at the machine, its dusty and outdated appearance.

"Don't judge the computer by its shell, my love," he muttered, and connected the old PC to the Tardis. Immediately, the screen turned on, clear as a hologram, and it booted up, taking only a moment, maybe two. The Doctor put his hand on top of the monitor and numbers rushed across the screen. He smiled, eyes flickering back and forth at an impossible rate, reading the data. Once he had finished, he shut his eyes and flicked through his memories and knowledge. He wrote the Praei history, the Krillitane history, the tales of blood and violence and pain. He told the tales of conquering warriors who were nothing but cowards slaughtering unprepared civilizations. He wrote of the potential for life and peace and coexistence and natural evolution and change. He spoke of the wonder of a form to call one's own and the joy of knowing it, flaws and all. He wrote the story of a people who had the potential to be shining beings if they would only embrace themselves and honor the faces they had slain to achieve their physical traits.

Once he finished, he saved the file and allowed his computer inside a PC's shell to infiltrate the Praei systems. He told it to start a virus, bringing to mind Mickey Smith's Bad Wolf creation that had wiped him from Earth history. This virus he named with a little smile and a great deal of mischief 'Mrs. Robinson,' and he told it to erase the Praei history, erase the Slitheen technology that would allow them to take others' forms, and to plant in its place, the story of the Praei. After he had finished, he pulled his hand from the monitor and sighed, rubbing his temples. He had approximately twenty minutes to get all the tanks into the Tardis, get off Carcipe, and lock down the planet. If the virus he put into their system was activated without the planet-lock on, the system would assume he failed and lock down the planet for good. It was a safety precaution, to make sure that if he failed, the Praei didn't get off their moon and take the universe by force.

"Twenty minutes to save the universe," he muttered with a grin. "I do love a ticking clock."

It was at that exact moment that a siren went off outside of the Tardis. The Doctor pocketed his sonic screwdriver and groaned, rushing from the Tardis and into the lab, still bustling with Krillitanes preparing for the final unborn child—the Time Lord.

XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX

"He came back to life!" Amy gasped. River nodded, looking around the dingy hallway.

"Yeah, he does that."

"But he came _back to_ _life_," Rory said, equally shocked.

"Yeah," River repeated, slower this time. "He _does_ that…Mum, Dad, I swear I'll explain later but can we _focus_?"

"Right," Amy agreed, nodding, making her coppery locks bounce, and looking at her husband, who also nodded.

"Great. He didn't leave me with anything, daft man, but we should be able to find him fairly easily. Just listen for commotion…"

All three Ponds paused, heads cocked, listening intently for the faintest trace of ruckus.

"Can I help you?" an extremely cool voice asked from behind them.

Looking relieved, Rory turned and found himself face-to-face with a pale, skeletal Krillitane. His face immediately fell.

"Oh…" he said, disappointed.

"River Song," the Krillitane said coolly. "I am Brother Yurr. I have had the misfortune of meeting your husband."

"Yeah, he has that effect on people," River replied, mildly sympathetic.

"I look forward to watching you bleed out in front of him," Brother Yurr told her, seeming cheered by this idea.

River wrinkled her nose,

"I don't much fancy that, actually. I'll be going now."

"Going?" Yurr replied, chuckling. "I think not."

River smiled then, the particular smile that the Doctor found both mildly worrisome and an enormous turn-on.

"I respectfully disagree."

She backed up her entirely scholarly opinion with a plasma bolt to the chest. It was an extremely convincing argument.

Unfortunately, as soon as Brother Yurr hit the floor, his black spacesuit-looking thing began to smoke and an alarm sounded. River looked around, scowling.

"Well damn. I was really hoping for a more obvious announcement of our arrival."

Rory snorted with laughter as they began to run.

"You inherited your sense of humor from Amy, didn't you?"

"Mum has a sense of humor?" River asked in mock-surprise. Amy sped up a bit to run alongside her daughter and took advantage of the proximity, smacking her daughter's curly head.

"Cheeky."

"I learned from the best."

XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX

The Doctor crept down the hall as quickly as he could, careful not to attract the attention of the Praei whom had flooded the corridors, presumably looking for his wife.

"Couldn't just listen _once_, could you River?" he muttered.

At that moment, the sirens turned off and he froze for a moment, paling. They'd have only turned off the alarms if they'd found her. Which meant…he turned and began his rapid-creeping in another direction, towards the Grand Chancellor's receiving chamber. So rushed was he, that he nearly tripped over a little Krillitane, waist-high and with pinker skin than the milky pale adults.

"Hello," the Doctor said. The little Krillitane peered curiously up at him.

"You're not Praei," it said.

"I'm the Doctor."

It seemed to take this as a satisfactory explanation.

"What's your name?"

"Son Gully."

"Well, Son Gully, I'm sort of in a rush, but I'll catch up with you later."

"I ought to raise the alarm," Son Gully told him.

"Why's that then?"

"You're in intruder, aren't you?"

"Well, Son Gully, the alarms for intruders were on, weren't they?"

The child nodded.

"And they're off now, right?"

He nodded again.

"Well that means they've gotten the intruders, doesn't it? And since I'm not caught, I can't be an intruder."

The child considered this for a moment.

"Are you sure?"

"I've been here before you were born," the Doctor told him. "Why don't you run along now, all right Son Gully? And read stories; stories are brilliant things."

Gully nodded and the Doctor waved and began to sprint towards the Grand Chancellor's chambers again. Gully watched him for a moment and then walked on to visit his mother, which was his original destination in the first place.

XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX

River, Amy, and Rory were subdued in the simplest way imaginable. Amy was grabbed by the throat from a side corridor and held at gunpoint.

"Disarm yourself, Time Lord," the Krillitane ordered. "Disarm yourself or this human dies."

Calmly and without betraying any of the shakiness she felt, River put down her plasma blaster, kicking it aside. Rory wished for his sword, watching Amy's pale face turn red…then being to pale to blue.

"She can't breathe!" Rory cried, "You're hurting her!"

"The Time Lord had not put down the laser pistol at her hip, nor the blade in her boot."

River pulled out the weapons and dropped them, kicking them aside.

"We're unarmed, see? Please, let her go."

The Krillitane eyed Amy and smiling, squeezed harder. The redhead struggled and choked, clawing at the unyielding bony fingers. After a moment, it released her and her knees buckled as she dropped to the floor, clutching her bruised throat. She gasped on the floor, gulping in air greedily as Rory knelt beside her, cupping her face in his hands, checking that she was all right.

"You could have killed her," Rory growled, and his voice was that of the Centurion.

The Krillitane shrugged,

"I could have. And then I could have used you as leverage. But humans are susceptible to threats to women; the Slitheen taught us this."

River's lip was pulled up in disgust at the mention of the Slitheen.

"Come with me now, humans, Time Lord. The Grand Chancellor wants to see you."

River didn't mention the Doctor, thinking that he may have not yet been caught. Instead, she calmly followed the Krillitane, and Rory followed behind her, helping Amy along.

The chamber of the Grand Chancellor was enormous, a cave-like vaulted room immersed in shadowy corners, lit by only a few dim lights. Out of the corner of her eye she saw a flicker of movement, but when she looked at it, there was nothing there, only shadows. River shivered, placing an unconscious hand on her belly.

"I see you have what we seek," purred a cool voice, and the Ponds looked up onto the dais that supported a stone throne-like chair. In that chair sat the Grand Chancellor of the Praei.

"Why do you want my baby?" River demanded, her voice full of cold steel.

The Chancellor chuckled.

"Two reasons, actually. One is because your child has elite genetics—the last Time child. And thanks to the _Doctor_—" the word was a snarl, "—we can no longer absorb other species' traits. We must take them while they are still developing, still adapting, still full of cells that have not yet chosen a purpose, and combine all of those genes into the purposeless cells. They were once called stem cells, and though they are fully present in adults, it's really much easier to manage over a dozen unborn children than it is a dozen adults. And to be frank, we wanted to hurt him."

"Hurt him?"

"Your mate, foolish Time Lord woman; he has harmed us irreparably and we wish to harm him. In what better way does one harm a husband than to slay his wife? In what better way does one harm a father than to slay his child? In what better way does one harm a man than to slay his friends? Do you see now, fool? Do you see the trap that you've walked into?" The Chancellor let out a loud cackle and from a dark corner of the room came the sound of one person slowly, sarcastically applauding. From the shadows emerged the Doctor.

"See? I told you the evil laugh would add to the effect," he said brightly. River rolled her eyes as he grinned at her, delivering her tag line with a hint or irony.

"Hello Sweetie."

She scowled at him,

"You're in a world of trouble, Doctor, so don't you try that smile on me."

"Time Lord, you carry no weapon. We have your wife, your child, your friends, all within our grasp. All the pawns have been moved and the big pieces are out to play. I believe this is when I say 'checkmate.'"

"Actually," the Doctor said with the air of someone making a confession. "I'm rubbish at chess. _But_…you know what game I am good at?"

"Enlighten me," the Grand Chancellor drawled.

The Doctor grinned widely, and held up his sonic screwdriver, and pressed the button.

"Shocks."

**Didn't see that reference to the earlier game coming, did you? Yup, I'm full of surprises. That's me, the surprise-fulfiller…actually don't call me that, it makes me sound a bit like a kinky stripper…ANYWAY…I know that some of you are going to protest that female Time Lords ought to be called Time Ladies. However I've yet to see canon proof of this and also, we're referred to as humans, regardless of gender. Therefore, it wouldn't be unreasonable to assume that the same thing applies with the title 'Time Lord.' Hope you enjoyed it!**


	28. Mrs Robinson Strikes Again

Mrs. Robinson Strikes Again

All the room's lights went on so bright that the Ponds had to squint. The Praei began to shriek, covering their eyes. The Doctor ran over to his family and handed them all sunglasses, which they put on.

"All right, now is the time to run."

Grabbing his wife's hand and nodding at Rory, they ran from the room, following the Doctor back through the corridors, not sure where they were going but sure that there was a plan. Amy adjusted her sunglasses as they ran through the halls, now brightly illuminated.

"You gave me palm tree-shaped sunglasses?"

"Pond, now _really_ isn't the time."

"I've got ones shaped like _teddy bears_?" Rory complained, "Really, Doctor?"

"Can we please focus here?" the Doctor asked, "The shapes of your sunglasses really isn't high on the list."

Rory looked over at River and scowled at the Doctor,

"Doctor, you're really pushing it."

"What?" River asked, and pulled her sunglasses off a little so she could see the shapes of the frames. "Oh I'm going to kill you."

"Later, honey," the Doctor said distractedly, "We're in a bit of a rush right now."

"Doctor," Amy called, "You've got a plan, right?"

"Of course I have a plan!" the Doctor objected. "I've always got a plan!"

"You have _not_ always got a plan," Amy argued, and the Doctor shot her a cross look.

"Well _this time_ I do."

"Where are we going?" Rory called.

"The Tardis," the Doctor shouted. "It's parked in the lab."

"The lab?" Amy asked.

"You wouldn't need to ask all these questions if you'd just stayed put."

"And you'd probably be dead by now," River growled, "So shut it."

"I'd be fine," the Doctor insisted. "I've got all of this planned out and under control."

"Which is why we're running for our lives," River deadpanned.

"You know, I didn't _ask_ you to come."

"No, you didn't give me a choice in the matter."

"For good reason!"

"Hate to be the voice of reason here," Rory interjected, "But can we focus?"

"Thank you, Rory!" the Doctor agreed, glaring at his wife, whom glared back. Rory didn't mention that he'd been referring to the Doctor when he'd made the comment, figuring that the information wouldn't help the conversation. They had to prioritize.

Dashing into the lab, the Doctor rounded the corner, running for the Tardis. He had a hand on it when simultaneous mechanical whines began. River's grip tightened on his hand as she recognized the powering-up sound of a plasma blaster. The Doctor shoved her behind him and handed her the key to the Tardis.

"Get inside."

"Doctor—"

"Rassilon, River, just get into the Tardis. We can argue in there."

She obeyed, ushering Amy and Rory into the blue box before turning to walk into it herself. There was a pale, white form standing beside her, grinning widely, rushing towards the open door. River tossed the key into the Tardis and pulled the door shut, calling,

"Lock it, my lovely!"

The Tardis door clicked and River pressed her back against one door, pulling the Doctor next to her.

"We're inside her shields," she muttered.

"Why didn't you go inside?"

There's one right next to us. He was trying to get in. I couldn't let him get into the Tardis.

"You're the most frustrating woman I know," the Doctor growled.

"You think it's unbearably sexy."

"Well, a bit," the Doctor purred, running his hand over the warm curve of her hip.

(Inside the Tardis, Rory bellowed,

"We can _see_ you!")

River patted her husband's shoulder.

"I can almost guarantee that we're making Daddy cross."

The Doctor withdrew his hand and turned to the roomful of Praei, all in white hazmat-style suits with tinted goggles.

"Well that explains why they weren't bothered by the light."

"You've got a plan, haven't you?"

"Well, I didn't really think that this would happen."

"So…no then."

"Not exactly…I'm working on it."

"I assumed as much. Well I'm not going to be much help with firepower; they made me drop all my weapons earlier."

"How come I can't get you to do that?"

"You weren't threatening my mother."

"I have _sex_ with you!"

"Well I don't wear them then, do I?"

"Not _most_ of the time."

"You like it."

"More than is probably good for me," he agreed.

(Still inside the Tardis, Rory bellowed,

"We call _still_ hear you in here!")

"You realize that my father is going to strangle you once this is over, right?"

"Yeah, but it was kind of worth it."

"I love it when you get all reckless."

("Really?" Rory bellowed from within the blue box. "Are the two of you kidding me?"

Amy patted his shoulder.

"She's my daughter, Rory." He scowled and muttered something threatening about the Time Lord who 'corrupted his baby girl'. Amy responded to this with a snort, knowing full well that it had happened exactly the opposite of the way that Rory claimed.)

"The Time Lord and his mate will be silent," one of the Krillitanes intoned.

"Oy!" River protested, "I've got a name!"

"Priorities, love."

"Right, sorry."

"Silence!" the Krillitane thundered.

Both of them fell silent, looking expectantly at the group. The Krillitane whom had shouted at them pointed at River.

"Bring me the female."

The Doctor stepped forward an inch and slid River's body behind him.

"I don't think so."

"I ordered you to be silent!" the Krillitane thundered again.

"He's rubbish at taking orders," River piped up from behind her husband.

"She's right," he agreed. "I really am. I don't even follow the instructions for that tasteful Swedish furniture from the blue-and-yellow store."

"Ikea, sweetie. And you don't _read_ the instructions."

"Well there you have it."

"Would the two of you _shut up_?" Bellowed the Krillitane.

"Sister Jarraa, is that you?" the Doctor asked brightly, "I'd recognize your dulcet tones anywhere."

"Yes, Time Lord, you are correct. Now give us your mate."

"I really don't have any incentive here. I mean, you can't shoot us because of the Tardis shields, you can't get into the Tardis, and you're not getting through me…so really I can't think of a single reason to listen to you."

"We can kill your child."

"Not likely."

"Time Lord children maintain a telepathic connection with their mothers. If we project a completely harmless telepathic distortion field towards you, it will cut off your child's connection to its mother. It will be born insane and die as its brain slowly disintegrates."

"They're bluffing," muttered the Doctor, "There's no such thing as a telepathic distortion field."

But River was no longer behind him.

"Funny, Doctor, how you never noticed that the perception filter had no effect on us. You just assumed that you'd made an error. Which you did, but not the one you thought. Before we were locked here, we absorbed the Shy, a race which has a built-in perception filter. And you never noticed the one we used to cloak the Brother that we had following you."

The Doctor blinked and suddenly River was before him, clutched tightly to a Praei with dark goggles on. She struggled, kicked and writhed in his grip, but the Krillitane would not be bent or pried or broken. The Doctor lurched forward, but she hissed at him in Gallifreyan,

"Stay back!"

"Amy and Rory are in the Tardis," the Doctor told the Krillitane.

"An unfortunate mishap, but we will not require them. We only require the child."

River was lifted and bodily forced down onto a shining table, pristine and medical. Her arms were strapped down with careful precision and her mouth was no longer covered so she shouted obscenities. The Doctor watched, trying to work out what to do, trying to focus, trying to keep calm. They were pulling up her shirt, pulling her trousers down, leaving her belly uncovered. She struggled, screaming and swearing, tears beginning to run down her cheeks.

"Sweetie, don't you leave that shield," River shouted, in between curses. "They'll shoot you too!"

"I'm rubbish at taking orders," he called back in Gallifreyan and her face paled as he dashed from behind the shield and was immediately caught between two of the Krillitanes. He struggled, but their grips were like iron. Sister Jarraa was clearly in charge and the Doctor wondered how it was that she had escorted him to his cell as well...maybe she was a favorite? One of the Krillitanes selected a scalpel from the tray of medical tools.

After examining the scalpel, he carefully set it against River's skin, slitting her open, starting at the solar plexus. She screamed, arching her back, pulling at the restraints, trying to fight. He could feel her inside his head, feel the pain, feel her fear, like bitter poison on his tongue. It was killing him; he felt like throwing up as they cut through her soft skin, as blood began to pool in the wound before trickling eagerly down her sides. The scalpel moved slowly; it wasn't even at her navel yet. Keeping his voice calm and a little sarcastic, he called,

"So…Jarraa. Chancellor's favorite, are you? I mean first you get to capture me and put me in a cell, which you failed to keep me in, may I add. And now you're in charge of this project? I don't know about you, but that seems a little bit unfair to me."

River struggled on the table but as the Krillitane with the scalpel turned to listen to the Doctor, she kept very _very_ still. He had a plan, that brilliant man. She could hardly think through the agony. She knew she was bleeding.

_The baby, please, the baby,_ she thought through the white-hot pain.

"I mean I'm not saying that giving you all the honorable jobs and letting all the others do the actual work is your choice, I'm sure you're very gracious about it. I'm sure you let others share in the glorious positions, am I right?"

He looked at either of his captors, both of whom had slightly relaxed their grip on him. One of the Krillitanes was muttering and Jarraa looked around,

"Why are you all just standing there? Proceed with extracting the child!"

"Well clearly you weren't selected for your leadership capabilities," the Doctor remarked. "Quite a temper you've got there, Jarraa. Bet you hold it well though, right? Never take out your frustration on your colleagues?"

There was another pause and a few of the Krillitanes had started muttering.

"Quiet!" Jarraa hissed, "Get on with your duty, fools!"

"Insulting too," the Doctor remarked and Jarraa rounded on his captors,

"Shut him up."

"Well why should they?" the Doctor asked. "Why can't one of them be in charge? I mean, they grabbed me pretty efficiently. No unnecessary jib-jab, they're doing their jobs well enough. How come one of them isn't in charge? And you over there, with the scalpel, yes you. How come he (or she, beg your pardon if you're female) can't lead around here. I mean, if he (or she, sorry) is qualified enough to do the fetal extraction, why isn't he (or she…again, really sorry if you're female) in charge of the science team? Clearly the most qualified individual in the room, am I right?"

"Shut him up now, Ruudef, Ottaal."

"He's got a point though," the Krillitane with the scalpel pointed out. "You're only really in charge because you're the Grand Chancellor's offspring, aren't you? You're not more qualified than us. Actually, Ottaal did better than you on the final tests. Beat you by a half hour and eight points."

"Nine actually," Ruufer or Ottaal corrected. (The Doctor wasn't sure which.)

"See? And let's be honest, there's really no reason that you should be running the science lab. You were absolutely awful at science."

"Silence Looru," Jarraa snarled, but the Krillitane with the scalpel (whom the Doctor assumed was Looru) shook his (or her) head. "I'm not saying you're not qualified for any joy, I'm just saying that there's no reason for you to be head of the guard _and_ supervising the lab work."

"He's trying to distract you!" Jarraa hissed, "Fools, do your jobs! I am in charge here!"

"Ruudef and Ottaal have got him," Looru said calmly. "But if we're about to go out and conquer all of time and space, you're hardly going to step down _then_. Better to sort it out now."

The Krillitanes around them began to mutter and nod. The Doctor reached into his pocket and fiddled with the settings of his sonic screwdriver as the Krillitanes discussed who ought to be in charge of what.

"The Grand Chancellor will hear about this!"

"Come to think of it, who elected the _Chancellor_ into power?" One of the Krillitane asked and the others paused, realizing that no one had.

"So…we've been living in a dictatorship?" Ottaal (or Ruufer) asked. "I still want to rise to elite status and get our freedom back, but what's the Chancellor gonna have us do next?" There were murmurs of assent and River had to clench her teeth to prevent herself from screaming with pain.

_Hold on, my love, _he whispered, brushing the whisper into her mind. Her agony still burnt inside of him, still hurt him, but he had to be strong just then. He had to make everything better. Fiddling with his sonic, he pressed it, releasing River's bonds.

_Stay put, River. _

He fiddled with the screwdriver again and as one of the Krillitanes paused to ask,

"What's that sound?" he pressed the button again and all the lights went out.

Wrenching his arms free, he pressed the tip of his screwdriver to his sunglasses and put them back on, changing them to night-vision. Weaving through the Praei, he ran to River and picked her up, bridal-style, and made for the Tardis. He clicked his fingers and the doors opened, allowing him to dash inside. He shut the doors behind him and locked them before setting River down on the floor. She was pale now, biting her lip, her face tight with pain. He smoothed her hair back, his hand brushing where her sunglasses were perched on her hair.

"Rory, sickbay, little gold jar. Hurry."

Rory ran and the Doctor grabbed his wife's hand.

"Don't you worry, River Song. Everything's going to be okay."

The slit ran from her solar plexus to just above her navel, and it was deep. He knew that if he cared to stick his fingers into the wound, he could touch at least one of her vital organs. Where was Rory?

"What's 'Mrs. Robinson'?" Amy asked.

"Computer virus to override the Praei systems; where is Rory?" He practically shouted.

River's father ran back into the console room and handed the jar to the Doctor.

"What's in there?"

"Not now, Rory!"  
>He opened the jar and ran a hand over her hair again.<p>

"This is going to hurt, love. Just hold Rory's hand."

River grabbed the hem of his jacket and clutched at it, holding it in her fist.

"Ready?"

She nodded stiffly and he carefully smoothed ointment over the insides of the incision. She tightened up her entire body, clenching her eyes shut as tears leaked out. Her lower lip began to bleed as she bit it but she did not scream. Even as he pressed his hands over the cut, allowing it to stay shut, she did not cry out. After about two minutes, the skin was smooth and whole again. Panting, River swallowed and relaxed.

"Does it hurt anymore?"

She shook her head and he helped her to her feet; her clothes and his hands stained with her blood.

"We ought to go wash up."

He didn't see her hand until it hit his cheek with a sharp thwack, causing the sound to ring through the console room. He held his hand up to it, ears still ringing from the weight of her blow. His bloody fingers stained his face, but he was too busy staring at her in open-mouthed shock.

"_That_," she said, "Was for abandoning me on a planet and going off by yourself."

"I wanted to keep you and our baby safe."

She slapped him again and he staggered back with the shock of the second, even more unexpected blow.

"_That_," she told him, "Was for not asking me before you abandoned me on an uninhabited planet."

He put his bloody hand back on his cheek and she wiped the blood on her hand on her trousers, already bloody and rumpled, before smacking him a third and final time.

"And _that_ was for naming the virus Mrs. Robinson."

Grabbing his shirt-front, she pulled him to her, giving him a slow, deep kiss.

"Thank you for rescuing me. I love you."

"You're mad, you know that?" he asked her hoarsely, still holding his cheek.

She smirked.

"I love you too, River." After a moment, he looked around. "Excellent, we've got exactly nine-and-a-half minutes to save the babies and get off this planet."

"Oh good," River grinned as she slid her sunglasses over her eyes. Each lens was surrounded by a plastic frame that looked like a leg, sexily extended and covered in fishnet stockings, reminiscent of the cover of 'The Graduate.'

"I love a ticking clock."

**After much procrastination, it's DONE! Now…to work out how to save the universe in nine-and-a-half minutes….I need another ice cream. Also, those of you who don't know, Mrs. Robinson refers to the movie 'The Graduate' when an older woman seduces the younger man. You see the parallels?**


	29. Nine and a Half Minutes

Nine-and-a-Half Minutes

"So, nine-and-a-half minutes!" the Doctor cried excitedly. "We've got to get all those tanks into the Tardis, and then get out of here before the planet locks down. Biggest problem here is we've for a whole roomful of cross Krillitanes—ooh I quite like that, cross Krillitanes, that's good. I'm keeping that. But, back to the point! Any suggestions?"

"Shoot them," River said dryly, reappearing in the doorway with another plasma blaster and a mildly murderous expression.

"Any _other_ suggestions?" the Doctor asked.

"Distract them," Rory suggestions.

"Anything more specific than that?"

There was general silence.

"I swear, you've all been aptly named," the Doctor muttered, thinking of the Legs, the Nose, and Mrs. Robinson.

"Aptly named?" River asked, and the Doctor grinned, enjoying his moment of victory.

"Spoilers."

"Right."

"Okay here's the plan," the Doctor said. "River, I'll need that vortex manipulator you're trying to hide so casually, and the collection of crackers you hid from me last Christmas. Amy, go to the wardrobe, to the third level and on the eighth row down on the left, there's a shimmery silver dress. Go put that on. Rory, you know where your Centurion costume is. You can put that on. I'll go fetch the med scanner, a package of jammie dodgers, and my super-cool layer goggles. All right…go!"

The group split up, running to various corners of the Tardis to grab the items that the Doctor had mentioned. It took them perhaps two minutes to meet in the console room. Rory stared at his wife, open-mouthed, and then glanced murderously over at the Doctor, who put his hands up in surrender.

"Sorry, I don't remember it being so…revealing…but that's not the point. There's a little switch along the neckline…but don't turn it on unless you're wearing…these. He handed her a pair of very ordinary-looking sunglasses, then handed identical pairs out to River and Rory.

"That dress will make hypnotizing patterns and light shows, so try not to look at it, even with the glasses on. The glasses will filter out most of the extra beams, but again, try not to look at them. River, where are those Christmas crackers?"

River handed him the bag full of paper Christmas favors, which he then passed on to Amy. Rory scowled, standing in his Centurion costume, fiddling with his sword.

"Amy, your main job it distracting them, and once they're all out in the hall, Rory, you drop this." He handed Rory a crystal paperweight.

"Only _here_, everybody eat a jammie dodger."

"Is right now really the time for sweets?" Rory asked, but the Doctor handed him a jammie dodger anyhow.

"They have an antidote to the knock-out gas in the paperweight. Eating one should make you immune for about two hours. However, if you start seeing large purple rabbits hopping all over the place, try not to breathe in too much of the gas, because that would mean that these are the wrong jammie dodgers."

Amy shot him a questioning look and River shook her head.

"It's better not to ask. Really, it _is_ better to just not ask. Trust me."

"Right then," the Doctor exclaimed, clapping his hands. "River, give your mum the vortex manipulator. You'll have to set it for about…thirty seconds from right now, and out in the hall."

River strapped the vortex manipulator to Amy's wrist and programmed it.

"Rory, hang onto Amy's arm and once you get out there, the pair of you set off all those crackers and once they come to investigate, turn on the dress. Once everyone's out in the hall and distracted, run in here and we'll seal the door. We're down to seven minutes. And…go."

Amy slapped her palm down onto the vortex manipulator, and she and Rory promptly vanished. After a moment, the Doctor and River could hear a steady stream of gunshot-grade popping sounds and the Doctor poked his head out of the Tardis. The lab was clear. The Doctor snapped a pair of retro motorcycle goggles and brandished the sonic screwdriver, tossing River the med-scanner.

"Let's get started, shall we?"

Amy and Rory dashed inside, slamming the door behind them. The Doctor pointed the sonic screwdriver at the door and with a flick, locked it.

"Rory, take that sword and hack the door controls to pieces, would you? Let's make sure they can't get back in. And Amy…you've got to turn off that dress, Rory's drooling already."

Amy smirked, tossing her red hair,

"He's not drooling because the hypnosis circuits are on."

"Mum, no offense, but it's a little weird to hear all that from my mum."

"Yeah?" Rory asked grouchily, hacking at the control panel with his sword. "Imagine how I feel, listening to the two of you make little references to your sex life? I mean, really River? 'Quite the screamer?' Why did you think I needed to know that?"

"What?" River asked, wrinkling her forehead.

"Spoilers," the Doctor said quickly.

"He's got a point though," Amy agreed, "It was funny before we knew who you were and now…well it's still funny most of the time, but really River, a little subtlety would be nice. At least do your cleverness the honor of being used; you're good at innuendo and it's much less shocking to your dad."

"Seriously," Rory muttered.

"All right as much as I love talking about how we all feel about people sleeping with other people, we're in a time crunch here. Can we focus on the task at hand?"

Rory gave the door controls another good whack.

"I think I'm staying on task nicely."

"Yes, thank you Rory. All right, everyone except Rory, back on task. Actually…Rory can we re-direct? I need your medical knowledge over here."

Rory handed Amy the sword. "Go crazy."

She grinned and continued to hack at the control panel with Rory's sword.

"You gave Mum a sword."

Rory shrugged, coming to inspect one of the fetal tanks.

"Yeah, what of it?"

"Don't you remember my ninth birthday?"

Rory looked over at his daughter,

"Melody hasn't turned seven yet."

"Oh…well…forget I mentioned this."

Rory looked concerned for a moment, but the Doctor looked at him, asking,

"Rory, can you tell how far along these babies are?"

Rory studied the fetuses,

"How accurate do you need me to be?"

"Could they survive outside of the womb?"

Rory shook his head,

"It's not likely. Even if you got them into incubators, it's too early. I don't know how this whole artificial-womb thing works, but there's no way that they can survive outside of it. I mean, they've got some sort of system with the umbilical cord hooked up to these machines…no there's no way."

"I don't think we'll be able to get all these tanks into the Tardis in time. We've got six minutes."

"Doctor, we can't leave them behind. They're _babies_. They haven't done anything wrong. Their mothers are dead." Rory was the Centurion again, strong and fierce.

"Can we move one tank?" River asked.

The Doctor looked at the tank.

"All of us together…yes. Probably…I think we can."

"The nutrient-bags are hooked on the outsides of the tanks," River pointed out. "Can we put all the fetuses in one tank?"

The Doctor's eyes flickered back and forth, as though he was reading a page no one else could see. After a moment, he nodded.

"They'll fit, but we need to be careful. They're delicate. Amy, drop the sword, go into the Tardis and grab the box of gloves from the top drawer of the blue cabinet."

Amy ran as Rory inspected the tank.

"Doctor, we'll need to be careful not to tangle the umbilical cords."

Amy returned with the gloves, which looked like ordinary medical gloves, except they all glowed faintly gold.

"They've got a non-damaging cushioning shield. It softens any blows or pressure to the things you touch. Invented for the healers of Thyyre, which use energy from their bodies through contact; works really well on burn victims. Everybody put on a pair. Rory, you're in charge of making sure nobody gets tangled or hurt. Everybody else, be very _very_ careful and grab a baby."

Everyone walked over to a tank; and followed the Doctor's lead. He unhooked the nutrient bag from the side of the tank and hooked it over his arm. Reaching into the tank, he cradled the child in his hands and carefully carried it over to Rory, whom accepted the child and placed it in the tank as the Doctor hooked the nutrient bag over the side of the tank and rushed to get another baby.

They moved quickly and efficiently, and except for a very-close call when Doctor's foot slipped on some fluid, everything worked out all right. Even when his foot slipped, he forced himself not to throw his hands out to catch himself. He allowed his kneecaps to take the force, then his elbows as he bore the child safely, not allowing it to fall. Hissing extremely rude obscenities in Gallifreyan, he got up and handed the baby to Rory before rushing back for another.

They managed it in about three minutes, and then came another huge problem—moving the tank. The Doctor's mind raced; there was no way that they could move it without spilling out some fluid or hurting one of the children. After a moment, he ran into the Tardis, shouting,

"I've worked it out! Hang on, I've worked it out! River, get in here and start the take-off sequence! Rory, are all the kids okay?"

"Yeah, they're fine!"

River and the Doctor nearly collided as she dashed in and he, out. He was carrying what looked like weights with handles on the ends. There were three of them, each octagonal with a handle on the top. He pushed one against the tank and twisted the handle ninety degrees, then repeated the action with the other two handles.

"Amy, Rory, grab a handle. This will be lighter than you expect, all right? Don't life too much. Ready? One…two…three…lift."

"It's light!" Rory exclaimed.

"Yes Rory, I'll explain in a moment, just hurry. Careful, mind the step. _RIVER_ are we ready to go?"

"The moment you close the doors, sweetie."

"All right, set it down. Rory, check that they're all fine, Amy, shut the doors and bolt them, River, how much time do we have on the clock?"

"Thirty seconds."

"Doors are locked!" Amy called and the Doctor dashed about, pulling levers, setting coordinates. He looked at River and she nodded, yanking the final lever as they materialized out into space, a good distance from the Praei moon.

On the screen, the four of them watched a blurry shield circle the planet, sealing it off.

"How long will it be sealed?" River asked.

"We'll see," the Doctor said. "I have a code for it, and I'll check in every few centuries. Once they've grown and gotten better, then we'll see. They've got to get over their past and build a new future."

"Doctor, what about the babies?" Amy asked. She was standing next to Rory, looking into the tank where fetuses in various stages of development were sucking their thumbs of making swimming motions or gently inspecting one another. River had joined them, looking into the tank. She grabbed the Doctor's hand and pointed out one of the babies.

"Rory says that he's twenty-one weeks, just like our baby. Look at him! Isn't be beautiful?"

The Doctor put his palm against the glass and the little baby, the child never born, curiously placed its hand against the glass as well. He was beginning to get a blue tint to his skin, but the Doctor reassured Rory that the baby was an alien and blue skin was one-hundred percent normal, and in fact, he'd be worried if the little boy wasn't blue.

"Our little girl looks like that right now," River whispered, and her face was so gentle, so in awe, that the Doctor didn't bother to argue that she couldn't know what gender the baby was. He just wrapped his arms around her waist as she watched the children play in their primordial bath, still innocent, unaware of the tragedy that had touched them, not worried about the future, content to swim and play. Amy and Rory watched as well, equally transfixed by the scene before them. The Doctor rested his chin on River's hair and thought to himself,

_Perhaps this is the true Arcadia_.


	30. Parents' Night In

Parents Night In

After they had stood there for a long while, just looking, Amy asked again,

"What are we going to do with all these babies?"

River's eyes were still soft and she looked up at him pleadingly.

"No," he told her, "Absolutely not."

"What?" Amy asked.

"River wants to keep them."

"What, all of them?"

River glared at her mother,

"Well what do you suggest? We don't know where they came from and what about their families? We can't just drop them off somewhere and say, 'hey, we've got a bunch of unborn babies here, what do you want us to do with them?' because as far as I know, there isn't an authority on fetuses in tanks."

The Doctor looked over at Rory,

"Well, I have an idea, but you're not going to like it. And before I tell you, remember it would only be temporary."

Rory paused for a long while before asking grudgingly,

"What's the idea?"

"We could keep them at your mother's house. She's a Doctor, she could look after them. And all we'd need was to take a sample of whatever's in the nutrient bags and replicate it so it'd be refilled."

"Do we really need all that time, though?" River asked. "Hypothetically, couldn't you track each of their gene codes through time to the moment of their conception? And from there all you'd have to do is fast forward a few months until the mother disappeared, and then return with the child."

Amy and Rory looked properly shocked by this outpouring of brilliance, but the Doctor nodded thoughtfully.

"That would work fine, except they're not ready to be born yet...or ready to be out of the tank, rather. And they should really be somewhere dark, like the womb. I'm not sure how being in the light all this time is going to effect their development."

"Right, so first we put a blanket over the tank, and then we take it to my mother's and then what?" Rory asked.

The Doctor nodded towards River,

"Her idea was actually brilliant and spot-on. We have to track them back to their families. And since they all have to develop for different amounts of time, we can go back and forth. Actually, with the Tardis here, we can do it all today, if you feel up to it."

Rory glanced at his rather battered watch, removing one of his leather arm-guards to do so.

"I think we all ought to get changed, and then eat something, and then see how everyone feels."

"Brilliant, who's up for fish and chips?"

There were nods all around and the Doctor fetched a big silky sheet and draped it over the tank.

"That should make it nice and dark for the little tykes," he said, satisfied. He looked at River and smiled, before recalling that she was covered in blood, and after she had slapped and hugged him, so was he.

"I'm going to go wash up," he announced. "Meet back here in an hour and give the girls time to get ready?"

"You mean give _you_ time to fix your hair?" River asked playfully.

"It needs to be fixed properly or it gets in my eyes!"

"I swear, you are _so vain_."

"You know that song?" the Doctor asked, and River looked mildly confused.

"What song?"

"The one you just said… 'You're so Vain.'"

"Yeah, what of it?"

The Doctor grinned smugly,

"It _was_ about me."

River rolled her eyes,

"I swear, between you and your ego, there's no room for me in this relationship."

Amy and Rory walked off to go change and the Doctor and River bickered good-naturedly as they ambled down the hall to their bedroom.

"My ego's not that big."

"If by 'not that big' you mean 'galaxy-sized,' then you're right."

"Galaxy-sized? My ego is not galaxy-sized!"

"You have a drawer in the bathroom devoted to hair-care products."

"I share it with you; they're not all mine!"

"I contributed two bottles."

"Two _large_ bottles," he argued.

"They were medium-sized, and I only use them when I need to put my hair up."

"You use the stuff in the blue bottle after you wash your hair!"

"That's to keep it from frizzing…not that it makes much of a difference. You blow-dry your hair. You're the second man in the whole _universe_ that I know that does that."

"I only blow-dry it on special occasions, when I want to look extra-cool!"

They arrived at their door, and the Doctor opened it, allowing them to keep arguing. And he completely would have, if only River hadn't begun unbuttoning her blood soaked shirt and slipping it from her shoulders. The argument (though it was entirely in jest) had ended the moment she began unbuttoning her top. He was a sucker for naked River, a fact she knew and used to her advantage. She was carefully stepping out of her bloody leggings, inspecting the bloodstains on her clothes with a resigned sigh, when he made a grumbly noise.

"You did this on purpose."

River looked up from her clothes, confused.

"What?"

"You stopped us from arguing."

"I didn't," she protested, still preoccupied with the fact that one of her favorite tops was covered in blood.

"You took off your clothes, didn't you?"

She grinned at him, finally getting it.

"What, Doctor? You can't concentrate with a little extra skin showing? Is that it?"

He pouted a little, but it was mostly an act because he had never once regretted seeing her naked and she was nearly there now.

"You don't play fair."

She smiled coyly at him.

"You could play dirty too if you wanted to."

Giving him a wink over her shoulder, she turned and walked into the bathroom. He heard the water turn on, heard her switch on the showerhead. Smiling, he closed the bedroom door and hurriedly began taking off his clothes. She had invited him, after all.

After they had showered, they tumbled into his bed, giggling and panting and kissing like they were newlyweds (which since they were still in their first year of marriage, technically they were.)

"Doctor," River said between kisses. "We can't…after sharing the shower and all that it lead to…we only have twenty minutes…we have to meet my mum and dad back in the console room…sweetie...Doctor?"

"Don't care," he growled against her lips, rolling over so he was on top of her.

"Sweetie…I promise…_later_."

Except then he kissed that spot on her neck and the sensitive place on where her collarbone gapped at the very top of her chest and she was _gone_, unable to argue, (not that she wanted to, mind.) So they were late by about five minutes, and his hair was still a bit mussed, but she fixed it on the way there as he helped her button up her blouse. Satisfied that both of them were presentable and _didn't_ look as though they had come directly from bed, they strolled into the console room where Amy and Rory were sitting and discussing which James Bond was the best.

"All right, food and then we work out where all these babies came from!" The Doctor declared. He was allowing River to do most of the piloting, seeing as he was still feeing drowsy and satisfied and he hadn't gotten to stay in bed and cuddle with his wife, which in his opinion, was an extremely important part of the whole married-thing. Rory didn't seem to notice and Amy pretended not to, trying not to think about how River was her daughter and the Doctor looked a little too satisfied, like a cat that had gotten the cream and was preparing for a nice nap.

"Sounds good to me," Rory said. "Are we still having fish and chips?"

"I sort of fancy Chinese," Amy said, and River poked her head out from behind the console,

"I'll eat both."

"She will," the Doctor nodded, "It's one of those pregnancy things. She eats duck sauce on her chips and she'll actually dip her fish in custard. And don't even get me started about what the woman puts on her sushi—don't worry Rory, your mother cleared her to eat sushi as long as we knew where the fish was from.

Rory nodded, closing his mouth. He had been about to ask about the sushi thing, but it appeared that the Doctor had gotten into the swing of managing a pregnant wife and was handling it far better than expected.

"So…Chinese and fish and chips?" Amy asked, looking from person to person. They all nodded in agreement.

"All right," the redhead declared, "River, can you get us to a corner close to both places?"

Her daughter nodded,

"There's a great place in London. The shops are next to each other, it's brilliant; here, call it in. Oh, and order me some pork dumplings."

She handed Amy a menu and a phone.

"Right," Amy said a few minutes later, "Yes we want a carton of chicken fried rice, a General Tso plate, a large order of fried pork dumplings, a beef and broccoli, and extra duck sauce. Yeah. No, we're picking it up. Half an hour? Yeah we can be there. The name on it'll be Pond. Yes, like a little lake. Yes. All right. Great. Bye."

About forty-five minutes later, when they were all sitting on the floor of one of the living rooms around the plates of food, Amy took a bite of pork dumpling and asked,

"Is it sad that when I think of perks of time travel, I think of not having to wait for half an hour for Chinese?"

"River thinks it's great," the Doctor said, shooting his wife a glance. "She gets these weird food cravings sometimes and you _know_ she doesn't like to wait."

River glared at him through a mouthful of chips doused in duck sauce and dill relish, unable to argue. She swallowed her mouthful and dipped one of the dumplings in marmalade. Rory looked a bit disgusted by the combination, but the Doctor tried it and gave her a thumbs-up.

"You finally found someone to share your tastes," Amy laughed, enjoying her spicy chicken while Rory quietly ate fish and chips, only a little salt and vinegar, like a normal person.

By the time they had finished, it was perhaps eight at night, their time.

"How about we just work out what's in the nutrient bags and make sure they're refilled and we can take them to your mother's house tomorrow?" the Doctor suggested. He was actually _tired_, which was a bit odd for him. He supposed the mix of adrenaline, fear, and sex had probably just taken everything out of him.

Rory nodded in agreement,

"I'm tired as well."

River began to speak, protesting that she wasn't tired, but she stifled the protest with a yawn.

"How about we stay in tonight?" Amy suggested, "We could watch a movie or something."

River slowly nodded, then looked over at the Doctor, who shrugged.

"I've seen nearly everything in the video-library."

"Well we haven't," Amy replied. "Who's coming to help me pick out the movie?"

"I wanted to see what was in the nutrient-bags," Rory said slowly. "If you don't mind."

Amy waved her hand, unbothered, "No, go be all clever and medical. River, are you coming?"

River smiled and shook her head.

"Sorry Mum, I want to see the babies again…I like seeing where our little girl is, developmentally-speaking."

Amy smiled mischievously,

"That means that you lot have to put up with my movie selection."

Rory groaned, but followed the Doctor anyway, and River grinned at her mother, muttering too quietly for anyone but Amy to hear,

"Pick something historical…you'll love listening to the Doctor's rants."

Amy's smile was mischievous,

"I was thinking something…Roman."

River chuckled and followed her husband and her father out into the console room, where the Doctor was peering under the sheet. He pulled a large number of unused popsicle sticks, like the kind used in crafts, from one of his pockets, and then a handful of multicolored permanent markers.

"It's safe to assume that they get different nutrient-fluids, because they're different species. Mark each bag with an X in a different color. I'll mark the popsicle sticks with the same colors and we'll use the matching colors to work out which sample came from which bag."

He tossed River and Rory each a few markers, and they put colorful Xs over the various bags before marking popsicle sticks and dipping them into the bags. Instead of scanning them, the Doctor pulled out a pen and little notebook. Rory couldn't get over how much stuff the man could pull from his pockets.

Rory, take note, would you? And River, look under P for powders or maybe V for vitamins for a big white box; inside of it there should be a bunch of pill bottles. The Doctor watched her go before picking up the first popsicle stick and putting it in his mouth. Rory resisted the urge to gag, but didn't and felt rather sick.

"Its blood, of course," the Doctor remarked, "But it's made for the baby, probably replicated from the stuff it got from its mother. All right…write this down."

He rattled off nutrients that were in the blood as Rory scribbled, and when River arrived, the Doctor had her fetch a large plastic bowl with a bag of red powder inside from under B for blood, V for vital, F for fluid, B for baby or U for uterus. River took significantly longer to find that one, and in the time it took her to get back, the Doctor had identified what each baby required. River returned with the bowl, which was really more the size of a large ice bucket that one might store cold drinks in at parties. The sealed packet of red powder was 'dehydrated blood base, of course' and had 'been invented by a race of healers who needed a neutral blood base which they could add nutrients to, regardless of species.' Rory was fascinated and River, slightly less so. Rory and the Doctor carefully measured and mixed nutrients and River was sent to pull a hose that went from the bathtub to the console room.

After mixing each batch, they poured it carefully into the babies' nutrient bags. Rory asked a lot of questions about pumping blood and why the babies could survive because the blood wasn't circulating from mother to baby, which the Doctor explained in very simple terms which Rory understood and asked for elaboration upon. River wasn't really listening, preoccupied by the little blue baby which she inspected, wondering what was the same and what was different about this baby and the one inside her.

"Ah, my Doctor and my nurse!" Amy declared, waving a DVD case aloft. "Sorry to spoil your medical fun, but I've picked out a movie!"

"Five more minutes?" the Doctor and Rory asked simultaneously and Amy rolled her eyes.

"Have you gotten all of the bags filled?"

"Yes," Rory began, sounding as though he wanted to argue, but Amy continued.

"And have you cleaned up?"

"Yeah, we did it while the Doctor was explaining about how the nutrient-bags work," Rory replied, still sounding as though he wanted to argue.

"Well come on then! The two of you can talk medical stuff tomorrow! It's getting late and I want my night in!"

The Doctor and Rory pulled the sheet back over the tank full of swimming babies, and River turned to follow after giving one last peek at the little blue boy, whom was trying to put his foot into his mouth. She wasn't sure _why_ she found the whole thing adorable, but she did.

"River, come on! You can stare at the tank of babies later!" Amy paused, seeming to realize how incredibly odd the comment had sounded, before she shook her head, deciding not to revisit the topic. "Just come on, I want you to watch this!"

"The movie or the boys' reaction to the movie?"

Amy laughed,

"Which do you think is more entertaining?"

When the film credits came up, showing the title of the movie, River laughed and Rory groaned. Snuggling against the Doctor, River settled back to watch the movie, not intending to fall asleep in his lap. She did anyhow. The Doctor hadn't meant to fall asleep curled around his wife on a large and squashy armchair. But he did anyhow.

Rory sighed and put his arm around his wife, looking at their sleeping daughter and son-in-law.

"_Centurion_, Amy? Really?"

"Come on, you know you love it."

They watched the rest of the movie in relative quiet, with Rory occasionally interrupting and pointing out bits, saying,

"Yeah, I remember that."

River woke up about halfway through and enjoyed Rory's stories in the middle of the movie, which wasn't particularly gripping, but wasn't a bad film all in all. The Doctor didn't wake up until the end credits and asked with a yawn,

"What did I miss?"

Rory laughed, hugging his wife closer, pressing a kiss to her cheek before they stood up, turned off the TV, and turned to walk back to their bedroom for a good nights' sleep. The Doctor turned to River,

"No really, what did I miss? I haven't seen this one."

River laughed,

"If you have a little time, I can show you something you _have_ seen before."

He pressed a kiss to her shoulder,

"It's the classics that everyone liked best anyway."

"Are you calling me old?"

He answered this by sliding his hands up her top and kissing her some more. Once he paused so they could get up and go to their room, she smiled, gently tugging his lower lip with her teeth.

"So I'll take that as a no."

"River Song, you can't play age games with me."

"Oh, but I can play other games," she purred.

"Any time you want," he agreed.

**Sorry, it's a filler and there may be some typos. I'm dead tired, but my dedication to updating this regularly has made sure that I posted something. Cheers!**


	31. Breaking Point

Breaking Point

The Doctor woke up with River's head on his chest, her legs entwined with his, one of her hands on his hip and the other on his arm. It felt so good, having her this close, her heartbeat gently throbbing against the side of his ribcage, her breath tickling her golden curls across his bare skin. Yawning, he shifted a little, getting more comfortable, and closed his eyes again, perfectly ready to drift back off to sleep curled around his wife. Only River's eyes fluttered open, and she mumbled in a voice still heavy with sleep,

"What time is it?"

The Doctor pulled his pocket watch off the bedside table and clicked it open. The numbers glowed in the dim room, casting a pale blue light on the tired faces of the couple.

"Six in the morning," he mumbled back.

River groaned and buried her face in his chest, pulling the blankets over the both of them.

"Why are we awake this early?"

"I dunno," he mumbled, settling back into the mattress. "I don't sleep as much as humans; you've got more experience."

She chuckled drowsily,

"In more ways than one, my love."

He didn't bother trying for banter; he was too tired.

"Go back to sleep," his voice was low and husky, as it usually was when he was tired, or post-coital, or both.

"I want to, "she murmured into his ear, "But I can't stop thinking."

"About what?" His drowsiness didn't interfere with his interest.

"That blue baby in the tank; the little boy."

"The Crespallion," the Doctor replied with a nod.

"They're all in that tank, not knowing what's been done to them. And he's just the same age as our baby, and it could have been her so easily, Doctor."

River's voice was beginning to tremble, which woke him up faster than anything else. Carefully, he wrapped her in his arms and held her closer, keeping silent. She still had more to say, he could tell by the way her muscles tightened, the way they did when she steeled herself to say or do something unpleasant.

"They were cutting me open, Doctor." She didn't bother trying to hide her pain any longer; her body was shaking, recalling the memory of only the day prior.

"They were cutting me open and I couldn't do anything about it! I tried to fight them, I tried but I wasn't strong enough and they were going to take our baby and I couldn't stop them!"

Breathing uneven and shuddering, she sounded as though she was about to cry, but was trying fiercely not to.

"It's okay to cry, River," he told her gently.

"It's not!" she protested, hurt and afraid and angry. "I used to be strong and now look at me! They tied me down and tried to take away my baby and they could have! I couldn't do a thing to stop them! And I didn't used to cry and now I do, all the time, like there's some sort of quota for tears that I never met and have to make up for! I can't do this, Doctor. I can't fight any longer, I'm not strong enough!"

Her eyes glittered with unshed tears and he cupped her face in his hands, staring into those eyes.

"You are the strongest woman I know. And shedding a few tears will never change that."

She didn't want to cry and she fought it, but as soon as the first tear slipped out, another followed, then another, then another, and she was shaking, sobbing against his chest.

"I can't fight them anymore, Doctor. I'm not strong enough."

He rubbed her back gently with his hand; the smooth skin under his palm was warm and soft.

"You wonderful, mad, gorgeous woman; you don't have to fight them. You don't have to be afraid."

"It's my fault," she sobbed.

"_Nothing_ is your fault," he assured her.

"If I had just stayed on that bloody planet, I'd have never endangered our baby." Her voice dropped, becoming so soft that he barely heard the whispered confession that she seemed so distraught over.

"Our baby isn't even born, Doctor, and I'm already a bad mother."

His hand was under her chin in a moment, forcing her to look up and though she fought to look away, look anywhere other than into those dark brown eyes, he held her there, a gentle hand on either side of her face. With a protective fierceness and love that she rarely saw displayed overtly, he looked her in the eye.

"River Song, you are most certainly not a bad mother. You are protective and loyal and brave; you are fierce and strong and you never ever give up. You _love_ with a passion and magnitude that I haven't seen in any other person in this universe. When they tried to build you into a weapon, you fought and you became this—beautiful, strong, compassionate, caring, _brilliant_ River Song. Don't you _ever_ think that I would choose anyone less as my wife…or the mother of my child."

Slowly, she nodded, her face wet with tears, her body still trembling a little.

"I know you underwent a lot yesterday," he told her softly, "And I shouldn't have left you there without discussing it first. But right now, you're going through shock. It's a little delayed, but that's all it is."

"I'm afraid of losing you, of losing our baby, of losing…myself."

"They got to you yesterday, and that was my fault. I should have seen that coming and I didn't. I got cocky and if I hadn't, you would never have had to go through that. I'm sorry, River. And if there is any way I can prevent you from being hurt that way again, I'll do it in a heartbeat."

"If I hadn't showed up, you wouldn't have managed to save all those children," she said softly, her voice still unsteady from tears and uncertainty. "I know that you want me to be safe, and I want to be safe, I want our baby to be safe. But I can't sit back and watch you run into danger. And you can't expect me to."

"You can't lose yourself, River; you've got too many people who know and love you for you to lose yourself. Me, your mother, your father, your friends…we'll always be here to help you remember who you are. And you're never going to lose me, River Song. I can't always be by your side, but I promise to be with you until your last moment." In that moment, it broke his hearts, knowing that it would be true, that he would be the last thing she saw. He only wished that it could be _this_ him, the man who knew and loved her. His eyes burned with tears begging to be shed, begging to be let loose so he could cry for River Song, for the most incredible woman he had ever known, the best woman he had ever loved. But he did not cry; he looked her in the eyes, trying to convey his love in that look, showing her that he could see into her soul and he loved her through and through.

She looked back at him, into those ancient, loving eyes, and nodded slowly; he kissed her teary, trembling eyelids, then her soft mouth. She tasted of salt and of _River _and there was nothing in the world that he would not give up to stay with her forever…but he couldn't. They lay there for a long while, not saying anything. Nothing needed to be said. Cuddling her closer, the Doctor kissed his wife's hair and they went back to sleep, his hearts beating against her back, and her heartbeat a lullaby for the baby in her womb who sucked its thumb contentedly and closed its little eyes, joining its parents in slumber.

**I know that River's tough and all that but they **_**strapped her to a table and cut her open**_**. Pretty sure that'd traumatize even her. I promise to make the next chapter plot-productive, and I NEARLY wrote in the baby's gender by mistake, but caught myself. You'll have to wait!**

**Also, all those who expressed interest in adopting the blue baby, I'll give you a tiny tiny spoiler. His name is Suyo and this isn't the last you'll see of him….oops! I've said too much already! Hope you enjoyed it!**


	32. Back to the Beginning

Back to the Beginning

The Doctor woke up for the second time that morning feeling significantly refreshed. After his talk with River earlier that morning, he felt as though a weight had been taken off of his chest. She was asleep still, his arms around her waist, cuddled against his chest. He reached over to check the watch on his nightstand. It was quarter to eleven. Blinking, he realized that this was the most sleep he had gotten in a long time. Even after their wedding night, which had been long and eventful, he hadn't slept this much. Wiping the morning grit from his eyes, he kissed River's hair and slid out of bed. Their clothes were strewn about the floor, still bloodstained from the day before. Quietly, he dropped them down the laundry chute, knowing full well that the Tardis washing machines had a cycle specifically designed to get out blood and dirt. It was labeled 'adventure wash' and had been someone's idea…Romana's maybe? He couldn't recall.

Yawning, he padded into the bathroom, closed the door to avoid waking River, and turned on the shower, groping sleepily for his razor. Finding it, he set it next to his shaving cream and stepped into the steaming shower, sighing contentedly. As much as he loved showering with his wife, it generally involved one of them pressed against a wall and very little of the time actually spent washing. Not that he was complaining, mind. It was just nice to wake up and stand in a warm shower, letting the water wash the heavy residue of sleep from his skin and his mind. He scrubbed his hair, humming some childhood tune.

It wasn't just the washing he liked in the shower, it was also the thinking. He didn't know why, but there was something about standing in a shower that brought on different sorts of thoughts. He supposed it had something to do with showering when you were still waking up with half-formed dreams still swimming around in your skull. Maybe it was because he didn't bother shielding his mind when no one else was awake and he could just let everything flow through him, like taking a deep breath. He listened and could feel Amy and Rory, sense where they were—in the kitchen. Amy was buttering toast while Rory scrambled eggs. If he wished, he could listen to what they were thinking, but he knew better than to muck around inside people's heads without asking. And besides, he required closer proximity to look inside someone without a bit of difficulty and right now he didn't want to work at anything.

He could feel River in their bed—odd, he thought, how they both thought of it as primarily his room, but it was their bed—and he sensed that she was just waking up. That Time Lord sense that he had, the one that let his kind communicate without words, felt her mind stirring, like she was slowly easing her way out of slumber. Within her, he could sense his child, whom was already awake. The baby didn't have thoughts the way he or River or Amy or Rory did. Even born babies didn't have thoughts the way he did. When they were about three was when their thoughts became more coherent and organized. Until then, it was senses or feelings or reactions. He let his mind brush the baby's.

_Hello, little one._

The baby liked this, he could tell that much, but it didn't know how to react. He found himself thinking of the babies in the tank, of the little blue boy on, on the same stage of development as _his_ baby, the one swimming inside River. He wondered if they knew that their mothers were gone, and almost instinctively let his mind settle in the console room, listening to them. There was a complex set of feelings there with so many of them. There was a sense of newness, as none of them had been twins. The concept of another being other than themselves was an entirely new one. They all seemed to like touching each other, inspecting the other children. And there was a sense of loss, a sense of something missing. It came to him as though they had told him with words instead of the strange senses that they conveyed.

_They miss her._

Each of them had lived inside their mothers and they did miss her. He didn't know whether it was the lack of her heartbeat, or the feeling of closeness and security, or the fact that their entire world—their mothers' wombs—was gone. He recalled Melody Pond, recalled brushing her mind with his, recalled the sense of confusion she had about her. This bright, new world was strange to her. He wondered if these babies would be any better or worse for living the way they were now.

_They'll probably have excellent people-skills,_ he thought to himself.

After scrubbing himself clean, he dried off, wrapped a towel around his waist, and rubbed the steam from the mirror, piling shaving cream into his palm before he spread it over his cheeks. He picked up his razor and carefully slid it over his jawline, leaving a smooth track in its wake.

River padded sleepily into the bathroom, shuffling past him to turn on the shower. She was already naked and didn't seem to be bothered by it, her eyes a little droopy from sleep. Neither of them said anything; she wasn't really a morning person and they both enjoyed the serenity of the quiet morning routine. She stepped into the shower as he carefully shaved his face and neck, and then carefully put gel in his hair, combing it the way he liked. Inside the steamy shower, she began to hum softly, repeating the tune that he had hummed earlier that morning.

"How do you know that tune?" he asked, keeping his voice low and calm. She didn't like to be startled in the morning.

"You hum it a lot," she replied, still sounding drowsy. "You've never sang it for me though, only hummed it."

"It's a lullaby," he explained, painstakingly combing his hair _just so_.

"Mmm," she replied, working conditioner into her curls.

"I can sing it for you later, if you like."

"Okay," she said softly, and he rubbed a bit of lotion on his face, checked his hair again, and walked back into their bedroom, pulling the familiar outfit from atop his dresser. He was standing in his boxers, socks, and was just buttoning up his shirt when she exited the bathroom in a cloud of steam. She gave him a peck on the cheek and walked through the door to the wardrobe, locating a skirt, blouse, and a pair of comfortable boots. As much as she adored heels, her feet were beginning to ache now and again, and they didn't seem particularly fond of her heels, especially the stilettos.

Dressed and ready, they emerged from their bedroom and into the kitchen, where Amy and Rory were finishing breakfast, talking about whether or not Melody's interest in her father's car was worrisome. Rory thought it unusual, but Amy thought that it was just another phase, like the mild obsession with designing tree houses that their daughter had gone through the month prior. Crayon architectural plans had been drawn on nearly any scrap paper that she got her hands on. Her teachers thought it brilliant and Rory had picked Melody's favorite tree house design and agreed to build it with her, minus the death ray and the elevator.

"Give her a few weeks," Amy said, "It'll blow over, just like the tree house thing did."

"At least hide all the tools," Rory countered, "Just to be safe. She's brilliant enough to take it apart, and if she does, there's no guarantee that she'll be able to put it back together again."

"Put what back together?" the Doctor asked as they walked into the kitchen.

"The car," Amy replied easily.

River poured herself an enormous cup of coffee, pouting a little over the fact that it was decaf.

"Are you drinking coffee?" Rory demanded.

"Dad, it's organic decaf; it's got none of the caffeine and all of the taste."

Rory nodded, placated.

"Just checking," he grumbled good-naturedly.

River sipped her coffee as the Doctor rummaged through the fridge.

"You want anything special for breakfast?"

"Not if you're cooking it."

He shot her a long-suffering look and pulled out a carton of yogurt.

"Yogurt and granola?"

She nodded and went to fetch the granola. Amy stared at the Doctor, aghast.

"You eat yogurt and granola?"

He wrinkled his nose,

"Absolutely not; but she's rather fond of it."

"I know," Rory said. "She liked to take little bites of mine now and again. She likes Choco Pops best, though."

"Melody does? Good taste, that girl."

"It's sugar," Amy said, bemused and taking a bite of toast.

"Exactly!"

River returned with the granola and made herself breakfast, snatching a bite of Rory's toast.

"You did that when you were a little girl too," he told her with a smile.

She shrugged, smiling all the while.

"You make good toast."

She had a sip of Amy's juice as well before sitting down and eating her own breakfast. The Doctor munched on toast and a banana.

Once they finished eating, the kitchen had been tidied up, and everyone was dressed and awake, they met in the console room. Rory and the Doctor checked the nutrient bag levels and found that they were still quite full; they probably only required changing once a day.

"To your mother's first," the Doctor said, "I've already taken scans of all of them. All we need to do is drop them off, track them down to when they were taken, and then come back and bring them home."

"Sounds like a plan," Amy agreed, and River nodded, watching as the Doctor dashed about his ship, piloting it with ease and the sort of mad way that he had about him. Feeling a smidge lightheaded—it happened maybe once or twice a day now—she sat down and watched him work, feeling content to feel the Tardis moving about before it settled, landing presumably in her grandmother's back garden.

"I timed it so we won't run into Melody," the Doctor said. "It's a school day."

River nodded and stood, letting her mind settle as she turned towards the Tardis doors.

"All the same, River, would you mind waiting until we went in, just to be sure?"

River nodded and walked over to the console, gently running a hand over it.

"Behave yourself," she told him with a smirk. The Doctor bowed rather gallantly,

"Anything for my lady."

"Shut up and go do what you're supposed to be doing," she scolded with a smile.

Amy and Rory followed him out and River stayed in the Tardis, petting the console with gentle hands.

"Does having us inside you feel like this?" she asked the Tardis, rubbing her own belly.

She got a sense of amusement from the great machine, and it hummed, sounding rather like a chuckle.

"I suppose I won't ever really know what it feels like to be you," she laughed along with the Tardis. "But I know that you'll protect our baby, the same way you protect him and I and everyone who comes through those doors. And I know that since you exist in all time, you've already met her. Is she wonderful?" she asked wistfully, but the Tardis merely gave a noncommittal sort of hum.

"Spoilers, eh?" River chuckled. "I suppose I deserve that."

"All clear out there, River," Rory called as he opened the Tardis doors. "And Mum wants to say hi to you. Apparently the last time she saw you, you were practically ready to pop."

River laughed and followed her father out of the Tardis, across the lawn, and into the house.

"Grandpa?" she called, and Tom poked his head out of the living room.

"Oh good, you're here," he said calmly, before enveloping her in a hug. "I made scones."

"I swear, you only like when I visit because you have a reason to cook more."

"It's not the only reason I like your visits," he said dryly, and she laughed.

Sophie came up from the lab, holding the pad of paper that Rory's notes were on. The Doctor answered questions and she jotted down the answers.

"You only need me to keep them for a little while, right?"

"Four to five months, yes."

"I thought so; they all look pretty developed."

"Well, I couldn't think of anyone better to care for them."

"River!" Sophie rushed forward and hugged her granddaughter. "This is the least pregnant I've seen you in ages!"

"I get huge, don't I?" River asked mournfully and Sophie laughed.

"You get more pregnant, silly child." She helped herself to a scone, burning her fingers a little.

"We've got a lot to do today," the Doctor began, but Sophie shoved a scone in his mouth and his expression became surprised and satisfied.

"…but I'm sure a short visit wouldn't hurt. Have you got any marmalade for these?"

"We have," Sophie replied, fetching him the jar. "And we've got the spinach dip for River."

"Spinach dip?" River asked, confused.

"You like it on your scones when you're pregnant. Try it."

River dipped the scone into spinach dip and her facial expression went from suspicious to pleased in a matter of moments.

"This is really good," she remarked, a little reverent.

"Told you," Sophie chuckled, and she smiled at Amy. "How's Melody doing? How old is she in your timeline?"

"Six," Rory answered through a mouthful of scone.

"Rory Williams, what have I told you about talking with your mouth full? And interrupting?" Sophie demanded, a twinkle in her eye.

"He's a grown man, Sophie," Tom said, pulling another platter of scones from the oven. "The man can talk with food in his mouth if he wants to."

Amy smirked, as did River.

"Mum, really?" Rory asked, taking another bite of scone.  
>Sophie chuckled, "I'm only joking, honey. You know we miss you. You could come by more often."<p>

"I see you at least once a week for tea, and usually for supper on Sundays as well."

"Melody's fifteen now," Sophie told him gently, "We aren't fall-back babysitters if she's too old for one."

"Oh…I suppose I can't ask what she's like."

"Beautiful as her mother," Tom replied, and Sophie nodded. "She's truly a lovely child. Growing up so fast; they always do, don't they?"

River grinned, "I remember being fifteen."

"Of course you do," Sophie told her tartly, "It wasn't more than a decade ago. Try asking Tom if he remembers being fifteen. It's more impressive then."

Amy laughed out loud and Rory and Doctor joined. The shocked expression on River's face was too priceless _not_ to laugh at. It was so rare for her to be shocked into silence that watching it happen was a delight

They chatted and ate scones and drank tea (except for River, whom was given juice) for maybe an hour, but the Doctor insisted that they really did have work to do.

"We'll see you in a few months," the Doctor assured them, "It'll be like no time has passed at all. And if you need anything, you've got my number."

With kisses and hugs all around, they departed.

"I really do love your mum," Amy said, "It's not often that you like your mother-in-law."

The Doctor shot Amy a look, and she grinned.

"Well it's different for you, isn't it? You're my best friend! I'd be deeply _concerned_ if you didn't like me!"

The Doctor merely grinned and programmed the Tardis,

"Looks like we're going back to the beginning!" the Doctor declared.

"This is where I am, and this is where I will stay." Rory intoned in a deep voice, "I will not be moved!"

Amy stared at him and River laughed.

"What?" Rory asked. "Come on, I've shown you that film a dozen times."

"What film?"

"The Princess Bride," Rory groaned, "I thought you _liked_ that movie."

Amy's face lit up,

"I love that movie!"

"I just quoted a line from it. The bit about going back to the beginning…Inigo says it…he's drunk in the forest…"

"Having seen the movie doesn't mean I memorized it."

"_I _recognized it," River pointed out somewhat cheekily.

"Of course you did," Rory replied, pleased. "You love 'The Princess Bride' right now. You act out all the sword fights in the living room."

"I'll just get us on our way," the Doctor said from the console, allowing his companions to continue to bicker easily amongst themselves.

And so they went off to find the family of the first child…

**Okay so there wasn't a LOT of progress, but I love writing banter…so indulge me. As for ze babies…we shall see how this turns out! **

**(To the reviewer who keeps asking to adopt the blue baby—if you want to babysit him at Sophie's house, I'm sure she'll let you in. Just tell her I sent you. ;) But remember, he's not born yet so…you won't be doing much.)**


	33. Beginnings

Beginnings

_**Doctor**__: I don't understand how it happened.__  
><em>_**Madame Vastra**__: Which leads me to ask when did it happen?__  
><em>_**Doctor:**__ When?__  
><em>_**Madame Vastra**__: I am trying to be delicate; I know how you can blush. When did this baby... begin?_

—_A Good Man Goes to War_

"How do we go about this?" River asked as the Doctor ran about, flipping switches, pulling levers, going about his usual haphazard piloting routine.

"Exactly as you suggested, that's how. Track them back to the beginnings and then fast forward a little."

"And what are you going to tell their families?"

"The truth," he said calmly, avoiding eye contact. He didn't want to think about it. He liked the idea of returning the babies, but not of telling the families that their wives, their mothers were dead.

They landed in Sophie and Tom's garden, precisely four-and-a-half months after they had left, and the Doctor, Amy, and Rory all trotted out to fetch the tank of babies from Sophie's basement. River was stuck—not for the first time—at how odd the whole tank of babies thing was. It was bizarre and…very Doctor. She chuckled and petted the console again,

"He's our mad man, isn't he, Sexy?" she asked.

The Tardis hummed in agreement and River laughed. The Doctor, Amy, and Rory came back into the Tardis, bearing a tank full of babies, setting it down on the floor of the console room. It was amazing, River thought to herself, that they could have grown so much in only a few months. It had only been moments for her, but for these little children, whom had doubled, maybe tripled, in size, it had been a lifetime. She peered into the tank and saw the blue baby instantly (he was pretty easy to pick out, being blue and all.) He was bluer than he had been at twenty-one weeks; now instead of pale blue tints, his skin was Tardis blue, and his hair black and fuzzy, waving in the fluid of the tank. River put her palm to the clear material of the artificial-womb and watched the little ones swim as Rory exited the Tardis, then dashed back in, carrying a plate of muffins.

"I tried to tell them 'no' but they insisted," he explained, closing the door.

"You really don't know how to be firm about rejection," Amy told him, chuckling. "Remember that time in first year when Emily Jenkins had a crush on you? You didn't want to tell her you didn't like her so you hid in the bathroom during recess for a month and a half until she gave up and started liking Thomas Ross!"  
>River laughed, looking away from the tank,<p>

"Did you really, Dad?"

"I didn't want to hurt her feelings."

She laughed harder, sharing a gleeful look with her mother before her eyes were dragged back over to the tank. She rested one hand on the small curve of her belly and the other on the glass, eyes on the blue baby. It was so painfully unfair that this baby was ready to be born and she still had to wait for hers. There were days (especially the headache-and-swollen-feet days) that she wished the baby would be born already. Other days she never wanted to let go, never wanted her baby to leave the safety of her womb. She had seen the horrors of the universe and she didn't want to bring a child into it…and yet she travelled with the most brilliant man in the universe, had seen its wonders and fallen in love, and it seemed cruel to deny her child that beauty. She looked at the Tardis-blue baby with the black hair, with the closed eyes. He was still asleep. One of the other babies poked the blue baby in the belly. The little blue boy slept on. River grinned, thinking to herself that it was like her mother's sleep—heavy.

The Tardis moved around her, going to the first location. It shook a little as they landed and River barely noticed.

"Rory," the Doctor said, and there was a strange, hesitant note in his tone, "Do you want to deliver these babies?"

Rory looked up, curious.

"Do you mean cut the cords and clean them off and check them?"

The Doctor nodded,

"I can tell you what's normal in those species, but I'm not really…competent…with delivering babies."

Rory nodded again, taking stock of the situation. He seemed pleasantly surprised and a little honored that the Doctor deemed him worthy to do this large of a task.

"We'll need to move the tank into the medical bay," Rory said. "I'll need to clean them off and clamp the umbilical cord. Also, we'll need blankets to swaddle them in."

The Doctor nodded and rushed off to fetch everything Rory would need and River grabbed a handle of the tank.

"I can help carry this to the medical bay," River replied calmly, and Rory nodded, grabbing the second handle while Amy seized the third.

The tank was shockingly light. River had known that it was going to be light, but it was like carrying a bag of groceries. Had it been grocery bag-sized, she could have easily cradled it in one arm, balancing it on her hip. They carried it into the med bay and Rory peered into the tank,

"They all look pretty healthy, and I've been wondering if all the birth—or lack thereof, rather—would affect them negatively. But C-sections aren't born naturally, so I wonder if it'll be all right. On the other hand, the hormones that go through the mother and baby at the time of birth affect them…I don't know. It'd be interesting to see how it affected them and they grew up after growing in the tank instead of the womb. Will they still want to be swaddled to simulate their mother's womb environment? It's all very interesting, really."

Amy nodded along blankly. She understood most of what Rory was saying, but his interest and obvious medical expertise weren't really on her level. River's interest was more obvious; she rested a hand on her belly as she listened—a habit that was developing more and more of late. The curve begged to be touched, and underneath it, the baby. Resting a gentle hand on her belly was the closest thing that she had to touching her baby. Within her, there was a flutter and she smiled, recognizing the movements of her child. This had been happening since their family vacation to Abestia, but it was more common now. She smiled and quickly put Rory's hand on her belly so he could feel the baby kicking at the wall of her womb, testing limits.

"Amy, come feel this!" Rory exclaimed, delighted, and Amy rushed over, but the kicking had stopped. Amy looked disappointed for a moment, but River crooned at her belly in Gallifreyan,

"Come on, sweetheart. Say hi to your grandparents now, little one."

After a long moment, the baby kicked again and River smiled as Amy's face lit up.

"It's so weird…and wonderful. Definitely wonderful," Amy concluded.

The Doctor burst in, his arms full of swaddling blankets and rags and a large bottle of what looked like whiskey but probably wasn't.

"I've got the cloths for cleaning them and wrapping them up in and also this is disinfectant.

"Disinfectant won't be necessary," Rory said, before pausing and asking, "Is that whiskey?"

"It was the only non-toxic disinfectant I could find."

"Why do you have _whiskey_ in the Tardis?"

"Your daughter is rather fond of it, when she's not pregnant anyhow. And Jack will toss back a bottle of whiskey like it's lemonade. His tolerance for alcohol is really _really_ impressive."

"I out-drank him once," River smirked and the Doctor rolled his eyes. "Yeah and you weren't making a lot of sense afterwards."

"I didn't throw up, did I?"

"No, you just paraded around the Tardis in a dress covered in yellow feathers, proclaiming that you were the Queen of Harkness-land and we all had to do your bidding or be sexed to death." He shot a glance at Rory and cleared his throat,

"That is to say…um…I had nothing to do with it. It was Jack's idea."

Rory shrugged, "Amy's the same way when she's sloshed."

"I can hold my liquor, I'm a Scot!" Amy protested.

"Yeah, but when you're drunk, you say some seriously odd things."

Amy acknowledged this with a tilt of her head,

"Well…yeah…all right you've got me there."

The Doctor piled the swaddling blankets on one side of the exam table and the cleaning-off rags on the other side.

"They're all really soft, because babies have sensitive skin." The Doctor seemed hesitant now, eager-to-please. With a smirk, River noted that he was acknowledging Rory as the dominant member of this situation.

Men, she thought to herself, and shot Amy a look. Her mother smirked and nodded, obviously thinking the same thing.

"Great, this is perfect," Rory told him. "Which baby is first? What planet are we on?"

"The nutrient-bag marked with teal, yes that one. That baby is first."

It was a little girl and Rory pulled on exam gloves, discarded his jacket (leaving him in a tee shirt and jeans) and reached into the tank, carefully tracking the umbilical cord down to the baby. While they discussed whiskey, he had taken out all the tools he would need.

"Is this species any different from human newborns?" Rory asked as he cradled the child, not yet lifting her from her liquid home.

"She should have antennae when she comes out, and you'll be able to see little scales on her. Orange tint is good and red tint is bad."

Nodding, Rory lifted the baby from the liquid and it opened its mouth to scream. He carefully cleaned the baby off and turned off the nutrient-bag, waited for a moment, the cord in his hand, and he put a clamp on it and cut it. After putting drops in the baby's eyes and checking for everything the Doctor had mentioned, as well as going through medical checks, he wrapped the child in a blanket and presented her to the Doctor, who backed up a step.

"I'm actually all right. It's not that I don't like babies, because I do, you remember that I liked Melody a lot, but I'd rather not…hold her. Don't want to drop her and all that."

Rory rolled his eyes and handed the child to Amy, whom expertly cradled the yelling, scaly infant.

"Out we go," the Doctor said, leading the way. They were outside a large wooden door cut into an even larger tree. The air was humid and thick, heavy like a very wet blanket, enveloping them in steam. The Doctor knocked.

"Did your wife go missing very recently?" he asked the lizard-y alien who answered the door.

"My mate vanished two weeks ago," he replied with a nod.

"And she was pregnant, yes?"

He nodded again,

"I don't understand."

"I'm the Doctor," the Doctor explained, "And we found the people who took your wife. It was too late to save her, but this is your daughter."

Amy offered him the bundle of squalling orange baby.

"It's not possible," the lizard-man told them firmly, but Amy offered the child again and he took it hesitantly, inspecting the little girl's face.

"She looks just like her older sister did at this age," the man murmured, and he stroked the bony ridge along the top of the baby's head.

"What are you going to name her?" Amy asked. River hung back, behind the Doctor, wondering the same thing.

The lizard-man murmured something alien and unrecognizable. The Doctor beamed,

"Beautiful name," he repeated the alien-sounding string of noises, "Absolutely lovely."

"Thank you," the lizard-man said, looking up at the group, "Truly, I will forever be grateful; I am in your debt. I thought my child was lost to me forever, but she is found and it is thanks to your kindness."

"It's sort of our thing," Amy explained, but the lizard-man was too engrossed with the baby to take notice. They left quietly, returning to the Tardis.

"Next child, then?" the Doctor answered, and went to pilot the ship to the next location. Rory nodded,

"I'll be in the med bay. Let me know when we've landed for good; I don't want to do that while we're all shaky."

The Doctor nodded and the Ponds went to the med bay, leaving the Doctor and River in the console room.

"Can we drop off the blue baby last?" she pleaded.

"The Crespallion?" he asked, curiously.

"Yes."

Usually, he would have asked why, but she was giving him a pleading look, one that looked both adorable and mildly out-of-place on her usually smirking face.

"All right, just for you," he replied with a conceding sigh. She grinned and gave him a peck on the cheek before walking back to the med bay where her parents were.

They delivered the babies—Rory from the tank and all of them together back to the childrens' families. Some took more convincing than others, (the Doctor had to pull out a med scanner for more than one of the families and prove that they were genetically related,) but in the end, each family accepted the babies. There was a lot more hugging, crying (a LOT of crying), thanking, and kissing than the Doctor really was comfortable with, but he dealt with it because of the way that their faces lit up when they cradled the little children. He had more happy endings in that one day than he typically had in a month.

Finally, after all the others had gone, the little blue baby swam in the tank alone, kicking and doing a rather excellent approximation of the butterfly stroke, only underneath the fluid instead of leaping out of it, as one did with a normal butterfly stroke. There was a shudder as the Tardis landed and the Doctor bounded in, beaming.

"We're here! Last stop!"

Rory removed the little blue boy and went through the procedure that he'd gone through with all the others. The Doctor and Amy moved the tank out of the Tardis—they were parked conveniently next to a hospital and the Doctor helped Amy drop the thing into the medical waste bin before he leaned in and removed all the clamps.

"Don't want to waste these," he told her. "They're dead useful."

Back in the med bay, Rory finished cleaning and swaddling the little blue boy and handed him to River.

"Hello darling," she whispered, running a finger over the child's blue nose, stroking his dark head of hair with her palm. "Aren't you just the most beautiful little blue boy I've ever seen?"

"How many blue boys have you seen?" the Doctor asked with a teasing grin as he sauntered into the medical bay.

"I'm an enormous fan of the Blue Man Group," River told him with a straight face. Amy snorted, but when the Doctor whirled to look, she put on an innocent face and pointed accusingly at Rory, who rolled his eyes.

"Right then, let's get this little tyke back to where he belongs."

They walked out of the Tardis and towards the sleek metal building. The Doctor knocked at the door they came to.

A woman (also blue, but at child-height) answered the door. She was small but her face had a keen, interested look. In Amy's opinion, she looked nosy, but she didn't mention her thoughts on the woman to anyone.

"Excuse me; do a man and wife live in this building? The woman would have gone missing recently and have been pregnant."

"Oh you must mean Yanni in room 608 B. She's the only pregnant one to live in this building in the past year. She was a single mother, though. Poor dear. Why do you need to see her?"

River stepped behind the Doctor, concealing the bundle.

"We were going to just…see if she'd come back. Her baby would have been due recently so we were popping by to give our well-wishes."

"Oh, well if she comes back, I'll tell her you stopped by."

They returned to the Tardis and River cradled the little blue boy.

"Blue, what are we going to do with you?"

The little blue boy blinked silently at her—he had not screamed at birth, which the Doctor said was perfectly normal. He merely looked at it all, taking everything in with his black eyes. River cuddled him closer, thinking of her own baby, whom was kicking again. As the Doctor began the search, River quietly sang to the child,

"_Little Boy Blue, come blow your horn.__  
><em>_The sheep's in the meadow, the cow's in the corn.__  
><em>_Where is the boy that looks after the sheep?__  
><em>_He's under the haystack, fast asleep."_

**Oh come on, with the little blue boy there, I had to use the nursery rhyme. BUT WHAT WILL HAPPEN TO THE LITTLE BLUE BABY? (Those of you who read the spoiler know that he's called Suyo.) And much thanks to those of you who expressed concern or a wish to adopt Suyo. He really is a sweetheart, isn't he?**


	34. Blue

Blue

The Doctor typed and searched and dashed around the Tardis console. It was such a frenzy of Doctor-ness that River found herself unable to look away from him for a long moment before the little blue boy began making soft whimpering sounds.

"Oh, what's the matter baby? Are you sleepy?"

"He's hungry," Amy said calmly, and River looked up, confused.

"How do you know?"

"They have different cries—babies I mean. They have a different cry for if they're hungry or tired or cranky or sick; it's sort of a mum thing to know which cry is which. You pick it up after a bit. He's hungry."

"Well I can't feed him," River said helplessly, gently bouncing the blue child. Even though he was hungry and crying, he didn't make much noise. His cries were soft; nearly whispers compared to the others babies' squalling yells of protest when they were removed from their liquid home and brought into the bright, loud world.

"What's the matter with him, Doctor?" River asked her husband, and he paused from his whirlwind of activity to skid to a halt in front of her.

"Why? Is he doing something odd?" He peered at the blue baby. "Nothing looks wrong with him—why do you think there is?" He sniffed the baby experimentally and River pulled away a little, confused with his reason for _smelling_ the baby.

"He's crying so quietly; it's not normal."

The Doctor chuckled,

"It's not normal for _humans_ to cry quietly. Crespallions, on the other hand, are very quiet creatures. They're able to make loud noises, but rarely do, even as young children. They're a little telepathic and have excellent memories; there's a good chance that little Blue will remember your face as a distant memory, even when he grows up."

River studied the baby's face, searching for recognition, but he screwed up his face and gave another quiet little wail, demanding to be fed.

"I haven't got anything for you to eat," River apologized, rocking him back and forth. "I'm sorry, little one. We'll find your family soon and they'll make sure you're fed."

"We'll find your family _soon_," the Doctor emphasized, shouting. "I'd estimate ten minutes."

"He doesn't understand you," River muttered, rolling her eyes and returning her attention to the blue baby.

"I speak baby," the Doctor protested, sounding offended.

"No you do not," River said firmly, "You pick up telepathically what they want and you make up the rest."

"_River_!" the Doctor protested, looking extremely put-out.

"Hush and work out where his family is," River told him somewhat scoldingly, "He's hungry and the sooner we fix that, the better."

"Bossy," the Doctor muttered petulantly, but he finished his dashing about and peered at the readout screen.

"Looks like his mother's brother and her brother's wife both live in the city…just a bit from here. Shall we walk?"

He pulled open the door and strode forward. Amy and Rory followed, both looking a little exasperated with the situation, and River followed last, cradling the little blue baby, whom was still whimpering softly.

As they walked, River hummed him lullaby that the Doctor hummed so often; she didn't know the words, but the Doctor, hearing the tune, fell back and walked next to her.

"Would you like to know the words?" he asked, and she nodded, tugging gently at the baby's blanket to straighten it.

Clearing his throat self-consciously, he lowered his voice so only she and the baby could hear it and began to sing. Amy and Rory paused, hearing the faint strains of the song and they found themselves listening to try and hear it better. They didn't understand the words, it was Gallifrayan, but something about the song made them want to be held. Something in the music made Amy's eyes tear up, remembering how she held baby Melody and rocked her to sleep; something in the song made Rory remember late nights when he carried Melody to her mother to be nursed, the nights she was sick and he sat up with her so Amy could get some rest. It reminded them of childhood, of the perfect security of a parent's arms, of the innocence and peace of closing their eyes to go to sleep, no worries or fears for the morning.

"What does it mean?" Amy asked once the Doctor had finished, but he shook his head.

"Maybe some other time."

There was a flash of jealousy within Amy and she pushed it aside—friends had secrets from one another and though the Doctor was her best friend, River was his wife. She knew things about the Time Lord that Amy would never know, and she had to accept that. She thought about all of this before offering the Doctor a calm smile and nod.

"All right," she replied.

They walked on and the little blue baby was asleep in River's arms. On a street full of Tardis-blue people, the men human-height and the women child-sized, they stuck out like a sore thumb, with Amy's copper hair and River's golden curls. Their pale skin and different clothes made them easy to spot in a crowd, not to mention the fact that _their_ women were at least twice the height of the Crespallion women. Despite the glances and questioning murmurs that were stirred by their passing, the group walked on, following the steady bleeping of the Doctor's sonic screwdriver.

At last, he announced,

"Here it is."

It was a house on the edges of the city, painted a lime green with black shutters. The door gleamed a silvery chrome and alien flowers sprawled over their beds and onto the path of sparkling granite-like stone, polished to a glassy sheen. Rory wondered if it got terribly slippery when it rained.

Over the glittering black stones, they walked. River's boots clicked on the granite and Amy rolled her eyes,

"Do you ever wear trainers? Melody does now; if she's not barefoot it's trainers all the time. She wears her _princess dress_ with trainers, for goodness sake."

"I _remember_ the trainers phase!" River exclaimed delightedly. "I had this brilliant pair when I was six, my very favorite ever…um, bright lime green only I wrote all over them in Gallifreyan with a marker so it looked really cool and patterned. Have I still got those?"

"Well, we know what we're getting you for your birthday," Rory said with a grin and River thought for a moment.

"Maybe I was _seven_ when I had those trainers."

They arrived at the door and the Doctor raised a fist and let his knuckles strike the door—once, twice, thrice. The metal door made a hollow echoing knock, like an enormous bell, but low and quiet. After a long moment, it was opened by a tiny blue woman.

"May I help you?"

The Doctor peered at her,

"Is your husband home?"

"Greiz!" the woman yelled, but there was amusement in her tone, "People for you at the door!"

"I'm popular this week," the man mumbled as he arrived in the door frame beside her.

"Your sister Yanni went missing a bit ago, correct?" the Doctor asked carefully, and the man nodded. His face was solemn, but pain was evident on his face. His wife patted his knee reassuringly.

"Yes," he replied softly, "Yanni vanished not three weeks ago."

"Well we found the people who took her," the Doctor said softly, lowering his tone to match Greiz's. "We were too late to save her, I'm sorry, but her son—your nephew—survived. You're his closest living family."

"Yanni wasn't to term," Greiz told the Doctor, "Her son couldn't have survived."

"I have a machine that kept him safe until he got big enough to survive," the Doctor explained, "And it took time, but he's to term now and he's safe...I can't explain it in a way that you would understand or believe, but this _is_ your nephew. And he needs you."

River came forward, her boots gently clicking on the stone path, and held out the bundle with the little blue baby inside it, fast asleep.

"He was hungry before he fell asleep," River said. "And we didn't have anything to feed him with."

Greiz looked down at his wife, accepting the bundle and examining the baby's face.

"Kuuro, would you run next door and see if Tyyren has any formula left?" Looking up at the group, he explained, "Tyyren had a baby a few months ago and she usually buys formula in bulk."

The tiny woman smiled and hurried out of the doorway, out of the yard, and down the street.

"Come in," Greiz said, ushering them into his home.

"We really can't stay," the Doctor began. He didn't like goodbyes, there were too many in his life already, and he didn't want to prolong the inevitable.

"I would take it as an insult if you arrived with my sister's child and did not accept some hospitality in return. Please stay for tea."

River smiled,

"Tea sounds lovely."

They went inside and were arranged in a rather tight fitting-room with a couch barely large enough to fit all of them. River sat on the Doctor's lap, but in a very casual and non-sexual way. They had settled into the parlor when Kuuro returned with a bottle of formula. The blue baby, perhaps smelling the food, woke up and resumed his whimpering cry.

"You don't have any other children," River observed, looking at the photographs of the couple. In a few there was a catlike creature with them, but not many.

"No, we don't." Kuuro said. "We wanted one, but it was not to be."

"Well it seems it was to be," Rory offered with a hesitant smile.

"I regret that our joy comes from such tragedy. Whatever else Yanni was, she was my sister and I loved her dearly." Greiz's face was solemn still, but that flicker of pain was back. He handed the baby to Kuuro, who sat down on a chair and began to feed the child, whom stopped whimpering the instant the bottle was in his mouth. Then he began to suck with a hungry intensity that he'd lacked in anything else he'd done so far. Even his cries had been relatively calm.

"He'll be a good strong boy," Amy said, eyeing the way the little blue child was devouring his formula.

"That he will," Kuuro agreed, watching the little boy guzzle down the bottle with a speed and ferocity that she'd never seen. "Hungry little thing, isn't he?"

"What will you name him?" River asked, and Greiz looked over at the baby.

"Yanni never said what she wanted him to be named…but he has returned to us, a light for us in the dark times of losing my sister. I think Suyo will be a good name for him."

"Suyo," Kuuro agreed, "It suits him."

"Suyo means light, or life, depending on how it's used," the Doctor explained to the humans (and human-plus) of the group.

They had tea, and the food, though it looked a little odd, tasted about the same as earth food, though with a queer lemony aftertaste. Afterwards, the Doctor rose and bid them farewell.

"Thank you for bringing us back Yanni's son," Greiz said. "Your names will be known to him, Doctor, River Song, Amy Pond, and Rory Williams. He will know them for as long as he lives."

"Just give him a happy life," River replied gently. She bent down and pressed a kiss to the baby's forehead before she left, smiling gently at Kuuro, who cradled Suyo in her arms.

"Goodbye little one," she said in Gallifreyan, "May you be a light in the darkness to many others. You will be _loved_ here, dear one, I promise you that." Pressing a second kiss to the child's forehead, she straightened and walked out of the house, following her husband and parents. They walked slower back into the city, and the Doctor hummed his lullaby again. Softly, River began to sing,

_ "If there is any one thing that I wish for you_

_ My child, my dear, my lovely,_

_ It's that you find a light in life,_

_ And make it your truth and only._

_ If there is a peace in life, my darling_

_ I hope that you will find it_

_ And save it away close in your heart_

_ Where time can clean and bind it._

_ I know life is long, my little child_

_ I know you have roads to travel_

_ But for now you are here, safe in my arms_

_ And sleep is your losing battle."_

**I really really wanted to make a sweet, good lullaby poem, and I'm half-pleased with this, but it didn't turn out QUITE how I wanted. Hope you liked it anyhow. And I hope those of you who were begging to adopt Suyo can see that he's got a good home now…however…I'm sure they have babysitters on Crespallion. (If you Google Crespallion, they are a legitimate Doctor Who alien. I just made up a lot about them because there's nothing there and I wanted a blue baby, dangit!) Thanks for reading!**


	35. Little Genius Child

Little Genius Child

After they were back in the Tardis, the Doctor looked over at the Ponds.

"So…you probably ought to be getting back to Melody, yeah?"

Amy nodded, and Rory added,

"I miss her, as much mischief as she is."

"_Dad_," River sighed, "I wasn't _that_ bad."

Rory laughed out loud and Amy joined him. River raised an eyebrow, trying to stay cool in the face of her hysterical parents. The Doctor stopped his piloting to lean around the console and peer at them, wondering what was so funny.

"What?" River demanded indignantly, "I wasn't that bad!"

Rory managed to stop laughing,

"River, how many four-year-olds who are left alone in a room for less than two minutes and use those two minutes to disassemble the telly and stack all the pieces in piles by the type of part it is?"

"How many two-year-olds build small, detailed palaces in their mashed banana?" Amy put in.

"How many six-year-olds can recite the capital of every country in the world and know the histories of at least half of those countries?" Rory asked.

"I get it, I get it," River grumbled, "I was bright."

Amy turned to Rory,

"Do you remember what her first words were?"

Rory laughed, and turned to the Doctor.

"We were really concerned about Melody because she didn't start talking until she was three. I was reading her Plato, because she asked for it—she'd go to the library with me and point out the books she wanted—as her bedtime story and I was reading something and she looked up at me and said in perfectly clear English, 'No Daddy, that's wrong.'"

The Doctor laughed along with the Ponds as River made a little 'humph' noise, sulking a little. The Time Lord kissed his wife's cheek with a smile,

"You're part Time Lord, love. You're naturally clever."

"And do you remember last year when we took her to the Globe to see Hamlet?" Rory asked and Amy laughed, grinning as she nodded and turned to the Doctor.

"Rory and I wanted a night out so we were going to leave Melody with a babysitter, but she heard that we were going to see Hamlet and she really wanted to go. She promised to behave and she looked so cute that _Rory_ caved." There was playful accusation in her voice.

"You didn't see those big puppy dog eyes!" Rory protested, "She just looked up at me with that little pink lower lip trembling and looking all sad and her eyes really wide and she told me that she 'really _really_ wanted to go, and she'd be the best girl ever' and I just _had_ to let her! You didn't see the face she was making!"

"_Anyway_," Amy said, throwing Rory an affectionate glare, "We got seats and Melody was enthralled; she didn't say a word for the whole play and her eyes were as wide as saucers. So afterwards we were walking out of the theatre and there was a group of teenagers talking about the play. And one of them was saying loudly how the play didn't make any sense," she started to giggle and Rory interjected,

"So Melody told them that she found it very easy to understand and she 'liked the way Shakespeare used Hamlet's dichotomy between his desire for revenge and his wish not to kill anyone as a reflection of the human tendency towards stepping on others to get what you want and the slow degradation of morals in modern society enabling this tendency and eliminating the dichotomy displayed in Hamlet to be acted out in the current age.'"

Amy was laughing so hard that tears were running down her cheeks.

"You should have seen their faces!" She choked out, her face red.

The Doctor was laughing too now and River made another grumpy noise,

"It's not _my_ fault that they didn't follow the play—_I _thought it was easy to understand."

"One of them asked us if you were some sort of genius-child."

"Amy told them you were just a midget."

"It was funny! They _believed_ me!"

Both of her parents and her husband were laughing. Rory was actually bent nearly in half, trying to catch his breath. The Doctor cried with laughter and River rolled her eyes.

"I don't have to put up with this!" she announced melodramatically to the occupants of the console room, but they were laughing too hard to pay any attention. She stomped off pointedly to the kitchen to fix herself something to eat. As she sat down to her bowl of ice cream, she smiled. One day she would have stories like that to tell about her baby. And with the Doctor's child, there were bound to be some interesting stories.

**It's short, I know. But I thought I needed a good chapter full of laughs. And I'll be leaving tomorrow to go to the beach for the 4****th**** of July weekend to hang with friends and swim and hopefully beg a surfing lesson from one of my friends. Unfortunately for YOU, that means no new chapters for a few days. Do TRY to survive, ha ha. Anyway, hope you enjoyed it!**


	36. By Any Other Name

By Any Other Name

They dropped off Amy and Rory in their back garden. After kissing her parents goodbye and promising to visit when the baby was born, they took off again. River sighed and gave the Doctor a peck on the cheek before she wandered off to do…something. He didn't really know what and she didn't seem inclined to tell him. The Doctor being the Doctor, decided to fall back on his usual hobby—fiddling with the Tardis.

Sitting in his hammock, he repaired wires and fixed this cable to that and made little repairs to things that didn't need fixing really, he just needed something to fiddle with. Goggles were fastened securely over his eyes, making his hair fluff up this way and that, flattening the hair stuck underneath the elastic band that held the goggles onto his face. If he paused to listen, he could here distant splashing; she was in the swimming pool. After he had fixed everything that needed repair and a few things that didn't, he ambled through the Tardis and found himself by the side of the swimming pool where River was swimming a powerful butterfly stroke up and down the pool, propelling herself through the water. Her eyes were open and she smiled when she spotted him, stopping her stroke and dolphin-kicking all the way to the wall.

"Hello sweetie," she greeted him, resting her arms and chin on the pool deck and peering up at him through golden eyelashes and a face dotted with crystal beads of water.

He said the first thing that came to mind, blurting it out without letting it go through any sort of filter whatsoever.

"I swear you're the most beautiful thing I've ever seen."

She smiled as he blushed like a schoolboy. Blinking those enormous eyes at him, she beckoned him with a crooked finger. He leaned down to smile at her, cocking his head curiously. She shook her head silently, still smiling, and beckoned him closer. Mystified, he got down onto his knees and leaned down to see what it was she wanted. With a radiant smile, she seized him by the lapels and dragged him bodily into the pool.

With a yell, he fell into the water with a splash. When his head bobbed back above the water, hair wet and bowtie sagging, he swiped his hair out of his face and glared at her, smiling despite his annoyance at being all wet.

"What was that for?" He asked, trying to sound outraged and only succeeding in sounding amused.

Smiling, she walked over to him, arms trailing in the chest-high water. She put her arms around his neck and in the reduced gravity of the water, easily lifted herself to wrap her legs around his waist, her whole body now pressed against his.

"You forgot clever."

He looked confused, a little overwhelmed by her nearness.

"What?"

She pressed her lips to his, carefully drawing a low, hungry moan from his throat.

"You forgot clever," she repeated, whispering it enticingly into his ear.

"Right," he gasped, trying to remember what they'd been talking about. Right. "Beautiful and clever," he agreed eagerly and pressed his lips to hers. She chuckled against his mouth and he could feel the laugh in her chest as she pressed closer to him.

"My parents aren't here anymore," she hinted to him.

He smiled and walk-swam over to the stairs and carried her from the pool, both of them sopping wet.

"I think I get where you're going with this."

"Do you?" she asked him teasingly.

"Well I've got this pair of handcuffs in a drawer in the console room…" he began smilingly, and she chuckled.

"You're clever as well, aren't you?"

The evening ended very satisfactorily for the both of them…needless to say they wouldn't have been able to have the same sort of evening if Amy and Rory had still been in the Tardis.

XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX

They ran. They played and laughed and the universe smiled on them. Their baby grew steadily inside of River's belly. Her midsection swelled larger and the Doctor became increasingly fascinated with her belly and the baby within it. He took to talking to the baby, telepathically or out loud. They sang the little one lullabies and River learned more Gallifreyan songs in those next few weeks than she had during the any earlier in her life.

She was thirty-one weeks now and though her belly wasn't as large as was typical of a human, it was growing larger. Her moods had stabilized slightly, but her feet and back were still prone to aching. She began to worry about the birth and confided in the Doctor about it.

They were sitting in the kitchen having supper—she was enjoying spaghetti topped with some alien sweet-and-sour sauce and he ate…well she wasn't really sure what it was, but he seemed to be enjoying it despite the fact that it was blue and a little goopy-looking. Her legs swung freely at the stool and she looked up at the Doctor, speculative, and asked,

"What are we going to name the baby?"

The Doctor choked for a second, hacking blue…whatever…into his napkin before setting down his fork, looking rather pale.

"_What_?"

River took another bite of her noodles, chewed, swallowed, and repeated her question.

"What are we going to name the baby?"

He looked down at his plate full of blue goopy…whatever…and sighed a tad grouchily.

"That's what I thought you said."

She set down her fork and cocked her head curiously, resting her elbow on the table, her cheek nestled in her palm.

"What's the matter?"

The Doctor looked towards the ceiling, trying to find the words,

"On Gallifrey…things are different."

"Different how?"

The Doctor leaned back in his chair and sighed,

"It's sort of a long story. Why don't we clean up first and then I'll tell you about it?"

River was so startled she nearly fell off her chair. The Doctor, though he had adjusted to little domestic things like eating dinner at a table together and occasionally making the bed, hadn't really gotten accustomed to clearing up messes and he definitely didn't do dishes. Keeping her cool, she nodded, knowing that he had to have a reason for stalling and she knew better than to push. Picking up her plate, she slid off of her chair and carried her plate to the trash can, scraping the last scraps of her noodles into it before she stacked it in the sink. They had gotten take-out, but she had insisted eating off plates and drinking out of glasses.

He scraped his plate into the garbage agonizingly slowly as River cleared up the glasses and the leftover takeout containers. She wiped the table off as he painstakingly scraped blue goop off of his plate. She ran warm water in the sink and pulled the tea mugs from the morning into the sink as well as their breakfast dishes. Pouring a little soap onto the sponge, River began doing dishes. The Doctor meandered over and slipped behind her, burying his face in her hair. She continued the dishes, gently pressing her back into his chest. With a sigh, he released her and slid his plate into the sink and moved to stand next to her, rinsing and drying the dishes she scrubbed. They were silent, and the only real sound was the clink of dishes and the hum of the Tardis along with the gentle sound of water running as they cleaned up.

Once everything was finished, she dried her hands off on a towel and he wiped his palms on his trousers. He didn't seem to be walking anywhere in particular so she slipped her warm hand into his and lead him gently to their bedroom. Once inside she closed the door; despite the fact that there was no one else in the Tardis, she thought it would make him feel more secure. Unfortunately, he seemed to be getting the wrong idea of what was about to happen. Despite his sad eyes, his hand left hers and began eagerly skimming up and down her body. His expression relaxed and she could see his pupils dilating. He pulled her closer and she could sense his hunger in that weird Time Lord sense that they shared. He pressed kisses to her neck and collarbone and she wanted to talk about the baby, but right now it was evident in the raw emotion that was bleeding out with the lust he emitted that he _needed_ this intimacy, this closeness, the safeness of being able to expose himself to her in the literal sense of the word.

She relaxed into his arms and let herself enjoy the feeling of his lips at her neck, his hand tracing the line of her spine. Her back arched, pressing into his touch. Her breath hitched. Inside her mind she could still feel his desire, feel that he loved her and he needed this right now, needed to be secure in this moment, in this time of vulnerability. She let all of her worries and outside thoughts fall away as he moved his mouth against hers and she wrapped her arms around him, caressing the soft hair at the nape of his neck, running her fingers up through his hair, massaging his skull as their lips collided, tongues dueled, hands wandered and lingered.

They removed each others' clothes one-handed, too immersed in each other to devote their full attention to the task. When they fell onto the bed, mostly naked by this point, River could feel the desperation in his kisses and she wondered if this was the right time, if they ought to be talking instead of…this. Carefully, she cradled his face in her hands and pulled away.

"Doctor," she said softly, tracing his jaw line with her thumbs. His pupils were large and his expression was all lust. Still, he managed to respond,

"What?" and managed to sound as though he was thinking with at least some coherency.

"What's the matter?" She could feel her body straining towards his, wanting him, wanting this, but there was something glimmering in the back of his mind, something not-quite-right in his eyes.

"Please River," he whispered, pressing his lips to hers. "Please."

"There's something wrong," she insisted softly, and he again pressed his mouth to hers again, drawing away her logic as he used her own body's reactions to try and draw her mind away from the present topic.

She was having none of it and she pulled her mouth away gently, running her thumbs up and down his jaw bone, searching his eyes for some clue as to what was bothering him—it was something about the baby's name, but she didn't know what and he wasn't telling her.

"Tell me," she whispered.

"Please, not now. Later River, I swear, but not now." He was begging now, his face open and vulnerable. Gently, she lowered her soft lips to each of his eyelids and then kissed his mouth.

"There is nothing that you can say or do that will make me stop loving you," she whispered into his ear, her lips brushing against his skin. He shivered and nodded slowly at her before she kissed him again and undressed him the rest of the way, carefully tossing aside his socks, boxers, and bowtie.

After they finished, they lay entangled on the bed, she holding him in her arms, his head resting in the curve of her neck. His breathing was slow and sleepy, relaxed.

"I don't like to see you hurting, my love," she whispered and his closed eyelids fluttered open and then shut again, cuddling against her. She held him closer, whispering to him in Gallifreyan,

"What makes you sad, darling? Let me fight it away for you."

He sighed and rolled over to face her, opening his eyes. They were drooping from fatigue and his usual post-coital drowsiness. She didn't know if it was a Time Lord thing or just specific to him, but he was always slow and sleepy to the point of laziness after this sort of thing; all he wanted to do was cuddle close to her and then either lay there or fall asleep.

"On Gallifrey," he began softly, his voice still low and sleepy, "A name is a very special thing. I could only tell you mine once. Not all Time Lords work that way, but a name is very important to my people—our people. With humans, your name identifies you, says who else is in your family, gives your teachers something to call you. In the Time Lord culture, your name carries on a tradition. You're named for someone your parents loved or named for meaning, for something they hope you'll be. You can take a title, as I did, but your name is something deep, something important. It's so hard to explain."

She pressed a kiss to his temple, whispered his Gallifreyan name gently against his hair, reassuring. He looked up at her.

"I had children once, you know. Three of them, two boys and a girl."

"I know, my love. You've told me about them. I have their names written in my diary. I couldn't ever forget them."

"My wife and I then, we picked out their names so carefully—the boys were named for what we hoped they would be. The older one—" He whispered his eldest son's name, letting the Gallifreyan sounds slide off his tongue. "His name meant courage. We hoped that he would be courageous and good. My other boy—" He whispered his other son's name. "His name meant kindness. Our society was already crumbling and we hoped that he would be kind and would show others love." He paused a moment and his eyes were teary. He rested a hand on her belly and kissed it, just above the belly button. River held him closer, knowing how much it hurt him to talk about his children, knowing how this baby brought him great joy and sometimes, like at that moment, great pain.

He was silent for a long time before he could speak again. "Our little girl, my youngest…we named her after her grandmother. She was a wonderful woman, my mother—she would have liked you, River. She would have liked your fire. And the littlest one, my baby girl…she was going to be amazing."

He blinked tears back, but they flowed down his cheeks anyway.

"I lost them, River. I tried to save them all but to save them I had to kill them and I'll never see those little faces smiling at me again."

She cradled him in her arms, pressing gentle kisses to his forehead, and sang him a lullaby, one of the ones he himself had taught her in their language. He relaxed slowly and when his breathing grew steady and slow, she knew that he was asleep. It wasn't just his breathing, it was his everything, the way he abandoned himself into slumber in the same way he threw himself into anything else he did. Resting a gentle hand on her belly, she kept the other arm wrapped around her husband. She looked down at the swollen belly, imagining the perfect little person underneath it.

"You'll help him to heal, little one. He's so broken in places that I can't always fix…but you're going to fill some of the holes in his heart. And he's so terribly easy to love, our Doctor. He's so beautiful and wise and strong…and a little bit broken. But we love him, don't we? I because I chose to and you because you cannot help it. We were made for him, you and I. Our Doctor. Our beautifully broken man."

She closed her eyes, knowing that they could save the discussion of names for another day.

**I'm back! My vacation was lovely and relaxing and exhausting and wonderful. Time Tots is now back on schedule, my loves!**


	37. It's Not Like A Shoe

It's Not Like A Shoe

They lay in their bed, just waking up. The Doctor had been awake for hours now, but had contented himself to close his eyes and lay there, just thinking. As busy as he was, he liked these times to just lay and think; silence was a lovely invention that allowed his mind to explore possibilities that it couldn't when he was focused on other things. She sighed contentedly and rolled over, pressing as much of her bare skin against his as was possible, soaking up his warmth, inhaling his unique smell. If she had to break down the way he smelled, she would estimate it was a little bit of dust, some Tardis oil, metal, that smell that space had, and…something else. She couldn't pinpoint the smell, but it was something only the Doctor had—she hadn't smelt it on anyone else she dated. All of this together was the smell of the Doctor—mysterious and wonderful and devastatingly irresistible, not that she mentioned that to him. It wouldn't do for him to know exactly how much power he could have over her if he wanted to. Taking a deep breath, River snuggled against him and looked up, her eyes sleepy and heavy-lidded.

"Good morning lovely," he murmured as she smiled up at him. "I think…I'm ready."

She blinked, trying to wake up a little; her brain was slow and still full of sleep.

"Ready for what?"

"I think I'm ready to talk about naming our baby," he said softly, chuckling. Yawning, she nodded.

"Okay, but we've got to find something we both agree on. And we have veto power."

He nodded, "That sounds reasonable."

"And…I want it to have Gallifreyan names. I know that it may never use those names, so we'll have to use ones that Mum and Dad can pronounce, but I want our baby to know about its heritage."

The Doctor pressed a kiss to her forehead,

"You're amazing, you know that?"

She smirked lightly,

"Of course I know that; you must have mentioned it a half-dozen times last night."

The Doctor blushed a little and her smirk widened.

"You'd think after being married to me for nearly a year, you'd have lost the blush," she chuckled.

"Some people find it charming."

"Oh I do find it charming, sweetie. And adorable; I also find it very adorable. But the fact that you've managed to keep it this long is a testament to your…Doctor-ness."

He sighed and ran a warm hand down her side, resting it on her hip.

"You're impossible," he told her with a lazy smile.

Her smile widened and she looked up into his eyes, returning his traditional response to being called impossible.

"Not impossible love, just very improbable."

He laughed let her cuddle closer to him before he spoke, his voice soft and speculative.

"The baby will have two names then, won't it? Like you…and like me."

River nodded,

"Yes. And she won't have to choose between the two like I did, or be forced to hide one, like you."

"You can't possibly know it's a she," the Doctor muttered, but River merely smiled and rolled her eyes.

"And you can't possibly be this handsome. But things happen."

He chuckled,

"You little flirt."

"You love it."

"I really do."

"Do you want to name it after someone?" River asked, being gender-neutral to avoid making him argue.

"I would, but there are so many people I wish our baby could grow up to be like. I've been around so long, River. I've met so many people, so many wonderfully beautiful people. I wish I could name our baby after every single one of them. But I want our child to be able to choose what it is, what it grows up to be. The first new Time Lord in centuries, excluding Jenny, will have a long road to work out what it wants from life. Poor child will have to embrace Gallifrey and simultaneously grow up to live in a universe where its people no longer exist."

There was a long pause.

"I always liked Katie as a name."

"Nah, too plain for our little one. Our baby is going to be the most amazing baby ever, River. We can't give her a boring name."

"All right, you give me a suggestion."

"Alonzo."

"Absolutely not. Even if our baby was a boy, no. You'd go around saying 'Allons-y Alonzo' all the time and scar the poor boy. Think of the psychological traumas you could inflict upon him!"

"It's a brilliant name! What about Bob?"

"No."

"But Bob was sacred, remember? Sacred Bob?"

River stared at him, puzzled, and he winced,

"Right, sorry. Spoilers."

"What about naming her after Amy? Little Amelia? Or if it's a boy, we could name him after Jack."

"You want our son to be like _Jack_ when he grows up?"

"We could do worse."

"Yeah, and we could also do a lot better. Imagine a littler version of me with Jack's charm and sex drive! He could actually cause that paradox with someone being their own grandfather!"

"Fine, not after Jack; what about after Rory or Tom? Or if it's a girl, we could name her Donna or Rose…Donna Rose Song has a nice ring to it."

"It has to be something that will last our child its whole life, through a dozen regenerations and faces. We need something prefect."

"I like Sarafina," River offered.

"It's not like a shoe, River," the Doctor told her, sounding a little frustrated. "A shoe doesn't define you for hundreds of years, a shoe only goes with a couple of outfits; this is a _name_ we're talking about. It has to fit better than anything and when the baby is born it might not fit and then we have to start the process over again!"

"I know that this is really important to you Doctor," River told him softly, "But we don't have to decide right now, or even this week. I'm thirty-one weeks along and according to Grandma, I won't be due for at least forty-three or forty four. That's ten weeks more—two and a half months. We've got a lot of time to think about this."

The Doctor nodded,

"Sorry…I just want it to be perfect. I can't use my name, not ever. And I'm 'the Doctor,' I love being 'the Doctor,' but our baby will have a _name_ and I just…I want it to be something amazing."

"It's _your_ _baby_, love. Whatever we name it will be amazing."

He sighed and settled back against the pillows,

"You're a lovely woman, you know that?"

She smiled.

"I like the name Lucia—it means light. And I've always liked the name Arthur—it's a good name. It means…stone, I think."

He smiled,

"I had a horse named Arthur once."

"All right, we're not calling him Arthur. But Lucia's nice. Lucia Song, the Doctor's daughter. What do you think?"

"Donna Rose Song does have a nice ring to it," he said quietly. "The noblest of them all and the one who made me better. We could do worse than that."

"And if it's a boy?"

"Ian," he said softly. "Ian Rory Song, perhaps."

"Well whatever we name this baby, I need to go feed it, and we've got a new jar of marmalade."

The Doctor yawned and sat up as River pulled on one of his shirts and a pair of panties before padding off to the kitchen. With a sigh, he pulled on fresh boxers, socks, and a dressing gown before following his wife to the kitchen, a hundred thousand names running through his head.

**Ah the naming of babies. Nothing concrete written yet, but I did a LOT of research and some imagination and I've actually got the baby's name. Notice, I never once said it was a boy or a girl in here…I left it open for either. SO—review as usual and if you'd like, feel free to contribute name suggestions or mention any you particularly liked!**


	38. Just Keep Breathing

Just Keep Breathing

**Thanks to all of you for the support and reviews! I selected a name before I even finished the previous chapter, so it's all been decided, but thanks for your suggestions. This chapter takes place five-ish weeks after the last one. Because as much fun as pregnant-River is, I think we're ALL getting anxious to see that little bundle of Time Lord-y joy. Also, we made it to FOUR HUNDRED REVIEWS! Give yourselves all a hand! And I hope to get many more….*hint hint***

River and the Doctor landed in her grandparents' back garden as Sophie was weeding a large patch of tomatoes. She looked up, surprised, as the Doctor peered out and asked,

"Melody isn't here, is she?"

Sophie nodded,

"She's in the living room with Tom…shall I send her home?"

"No, that won't be necessary," the Doctor said, but just then a little girl dashed out the back door. The Doctor closed the door to the Tardis and locked it as he was nearly run over by little Melody Pond.

"Doctor! You're here!"

He smiled as the girl wrapped her gangly arms around him and beamed up at him.

"Hello Melody Pond."

"You're early! My birthday isn't until tomorrow!"

"And how old will you be, Pond? Thirty or forty at least, right?"

She giggled and shook her head, tossing her ginger locks this way and that.

"_No_ silly, I'll be nine."

"Nine years old already?" the Doctor asked, beaming at her, "Really?"

"Yes!" She grinned at him and rolled up one of her sleeves, showing him a scraped elbow. "And look what I did yesterday! I was playing in my tree house and Dad called me in for dinner and so I tried to jump down and I scraped my elbow. But I didn't even cry!"

"You didn't? Wow, you're one tough girl."

"Daddy says that too."

"Speaking of your father, shouldn't he be coming home soon?" Sophie asked. Melody pulled out a battered fob watch from a chain around her neck and checked the time.

"Daddy will be on our street in…three minutes."

"Why don't you go surprise him and walk him home?" Sophie suggested, "The Doctor will be here for your birthday, I'm sure. Right Doctor?"

"Give your Dad an extra-big hug for me, okay Melody?" The Doctor avoided answering the question, knowing that he could guarantee nothing. The little girl didn't notice, but merely beamed up at him.

"Okay!"

After giving him a big hug, Melody dashed back into the house, calling,

"Bye Grandpa!" as she ran out of the front door and down the street to meet her father.

"She's certainly got spirit, doesn't she?" the Doctor asked wistfully, and Sophie nodded.

"I assume you're here about my great-grandchild?"

"River's inside now. She's thirty-six weeks along."

"Thirty-six?" Sophie replied, surprised.

"Last time we met you…well it's in your future…you told us that River would probably be pregnant for forty-three or forty four weeks. She's got a bit left to go."

"Poor dear is probably set to get it all over and done with. Why has she come to see me now?"

River opened the door to the Tardis and walked out…only her belly was large and rounded, so it was more of a waddle.

"I wanted you to check up on the baby, as well as…well…breathing."

"Breathing?"

"During labor," River explained. "I'd like you to deliver me if possible, but I doubt it will happen that way. And I want some techniques, especially since I don't want any pain killers."

"You don't want pain killers?" The Doctor exclaimed, sounding alarmed. This was the first he had heard of any of this.

"I don't know how they'll affect me or the baby; Dad said when I was a kid that I had really weird reactions to some medications and I know that aspirin could kill you, so I want to play it safe."

"We could use some of the pain killers that Time Lords use."

"Doctor, this is something I want to do. I know it's going to hurt, but I've been shot a half dozen times; I've been badly injured. I think I can manage labor."

Sophie snorted,

"If I were you, dear, I'd listen to him. Childbirth isn't a walk in the park. I was in labor with your uncle Jeffrey for _two days_. I thought I was going to die of exhaustion. Your father was better; six hours of labor. Still, it's no picnic. Take the pain medications if he can get you some."

"Grandma, I want to do this with no drugs. It's natural."

"Just because it's natural doesn't mean it's good for you," Sophie quipped, and River glared at her.

"Can't you just support my decision? I just want to have my baby and do it the way I want to."

Sophie nodded quietly,

"You're right dear, it is your decision. If it gets unsafe, though, I _will_ drug you. We'll make sure it's safe first, of course, but I'm not skimping on safety on a whim. Make sure that you discuss it with the Doctor beforehand though, because once you're in labor, you might just change your mind."

River nodded and Sophie pulled her into a hug and kissed her cheek.

"Let's go have some tea, shall we? We can do a few scans and tests and then I'll teach you those breathing techniques."

They went in and found Tom in the kitchen, popping scones in the oven.

"River!" He cried, delighted, and pulled her into a hug. "Goodness, look at you! You're just about ready to pop, aren't you?"

"Thanks Grandpa," River replied sourly. "Really. That's what every woman likes to hear."

"Excuse her," the Doctor interrupted apologetically, "She's a bit cranky."

Tom handed River a mug of tea and poured the Doctor another mug full of hot, steaming liquid. River bolted down her tea and then followed her grandmother down to the basement, stopping the Doctor when he stood to go with her.

"I'm fine. Just…stay and talk to Grandpa, okay? We'll call when it's time for breathing."

The Doctor slowly sank back down onto his stool at the counter. He looked mournfully up at Tom.

"She's been funny recently," he confided, "I think she's just ready for all of this to be over with and she's frustrated about having to wait."

"And you?" Tom asked, checking on the scones.

"I'm…" the Doctor paused for a long moment, trying to find the right words. "Rassilon, Tom, I'm scared stiff. When my children were born on Gallifrey, the men weren't allowed in the birthing rooms—I wasn't allowed to be there. I don't know what I'm going to do, how I can help. She's going to be in so much pain and there won't be anything I can do about it."

"I was there when Jeff and Rory were born, as well as Stella, our daughter. It's hard, but it's not as bad as you think. Sophie didn't need me much, she just kept sending me out to fetch her cold drinks and then when she actually had to deliver, she squeezed my hand so hard that I think she broke a finger. Other than that…she was very calm about the whole thing. Micromanaged as well, she did. She kept checking all of her levels and correcting the nurses…she was a bloody nightmare for the doctors there."

The Doctor chuckled weakly,

"Yeah, I bet she was. River's so strong…I don't know what use I'll be."

"She's strong on the outside, Doctor. But she's scared and she's going to be vulnerable and doing something that she can't learn to do in a book or even with a few breathing techniques. There's no way to practice for labor. She's going to be doing something new and terrifying and she's going to need you with her."

The Doctor sipped at his tea as Tom checked the scones again, and then pulled them from the oven.

"Was it awful, watching her in all that pain?" the Time Lord asked.

Tom was quiet for a moment as he put the scones on a cooling rack and turned off the oven.

"It was and it wasn't," he said thoughtfully. "She didn't scream at all, she just breathed and I could see from her face that she was hurting, but she refused to scream. I think it was mostly because the nurses were encouraging her to and she wanted to spite them."

The Doctor let out another weak chuckle.

"But it was because especially with Jeff," Tom continued, his voice softer now. "She kept checking the clock and then looking at me with these huge, red-rimmed, exhausted eyes saying, 'It can't be much longer now, Tom, right? I don't think I can go on for much longer' and then it would be hours and hours more. Those were the longest two days of my life. When Jeff was born, she held him for a while and then fell right asleep, she was so tired."

"You don't think that River will be in labor for two days, do you?" the Doctor asked anxiously.

"Couldn't say," Tom rumbled. "Have a scone."

The Doctor took a scone from the little china plate and spread jam over it before stuffing it into his mouth.

"Fatherhood is…terrifying." He said, a bit of jam dribbling down his chin from his full mouth. "I haven't done this in hundreds of years and I'm as scared as I was the first time."

"You're a good man," Tom said gruffly, "You do right by River and you'll do right by her child."

He handed the Doctor a napkin and the Time Lord cleaned the raspberry jam from his face, licking what he could reach with his tongue and wiping the rest up with the napkin.

"Are you two bonding up here?" Sophie asked lightly as she opened the door from the basement and walked into the kitchen, followed by River.

"No," Tom and the Doctor said simultaneously.

"Right then," Sophie nodded, smirking in a very River-ish manner, "Scones and then breathing."

River smeared apple butter over hers and had another mug full of tea. After a quick trip to the bathroom, she joined Sophie and the Doctor in the living room.

"River, lie on your back and rest your feet on the floor," Sophie instructed. "We're going to learn about several types of breathing and when to use them. The Lamaze breathing that everyone knows—two puffs out, one breath in—is all well and good, but you need to learn to relax yourself. Take a deep breath in and hold it until it feels ready to be released…good. Now once your lungs are empty, wait until you need to fill them. I don't mean hold your breath, don't do that during labor, but just stay relaxed and breathe when you need to. Just be very calm, breathe slowly. In now…and out. Good job, love. Again…in…and out."

Sophie coached River and the Doctor followed along, listening carefully to any tips or hints she had about labor. They spent maybe an hour in the living room, just learning to breathe in different ways. After that hour was up, the Doctor helped his wife to her feet.

"You be sure to practice those," Sophie told her sternly. "Every day I want you to practice, all right? Let these become habitual to you—whenever you're stressed or hurt or upset, try to use these. They'll help."

Kisses and hugs were exchanged all around and as they walked into the Tardis, River looked impulsively over at her husband.

"I want to go visit my parents."

The Doctor looked back at her and began to take some of Sophie's relaxing breaths. Rory, though by now he was used to the idea of pregnant-River, was still an intimidating figure. And adding a hormonal River to a volatile Scotswoman and the Last Centurion didn't seem the wisest idea. Despite his misgivings, he punched in the coordinates of where he wanted to go.

He continued his calming breaths as he started up the Tardis. If nothing else, this was going to be interesting.


	39. Nightmares

Nightmares

_She is lying on a delivery table, feet in stirrups. The Doctor is holding her hand. The last contraction has passed and she has a few moments to relax and take a breath. It's not time to push just yet._

_ "How am I doing?" she asks, and a white-masked doctor assures her that everything is fine and that she's not quite dilated enough to start pushing. Her husband feeds her ice chips, which she sucks on until the next contraction races through her body, causing her to throw her head back, her teeth to clench, ice chips crushing between her jaws._

_ "Doctor!" She is screaming now and he holds her hand; she squeezes so tightly that his face is getting a pained look. His fingers are losing feeling._

_ "Mrs. Song, you're ready to push now."_

_ "I can't!" she screams, squeezing her eyes shut, "I can't!"_

_ When she opens her eyes, she is in the delivery chair, the Doctor sitting next to her. Her feet are in the stirrups. The room is cold. Something is not right. She looks down at her flat belly._

_ "Doctor, where's the baby?"_

_ He looks up, puzzled. _

_ "River, what baby?"_

_ She is still in a hospital gown, her feet are bare. She sits up, wrenching her feet from the stirrups, then stands. The floor is slick and icy cool. Something is not right._

_ "Doctor, where is our baby?" She can feel the pulsing beat against her ribcage, the fear swelling up in her throat. Out in the hall, a nurse pushes an incubator and River runs out of the delivery room, down the hall, catching up to the nurse. She grabs a hold of the cart and looks in, desperate to find her child. The incubator is empty. She turns to look at the motionless nurse._

_ "Please, you've got to help me. I was having a baby and I opened my eyes and it was gone…please, help me. You've got to help me find my baby."_

_ The nurse turns to look at her and it is a Silence. In its palm, it cradles a white-blanketed bundle. It turns its dark pit-like eyes upon her, its voice like how she imagines Death will sound._

_**Forget**__._

River woke with a gasp, sitting up in the Doctor's chair in the console room, her breath coming in short pants. The Doctor was under the console, tinkering. In the middle of their flight to the Pond residence, something in the Tardis had blown a fuse and he was fixing it. The Doctor stuck his head out, looking concerned.

"You all right, love?"

She was trembling a little, and she squeezed her eyes shut, shaking her head to clear the last remnants of the dream.

"Nightmare," River said shortly and the Doctor eyed her suspiciously.

"Are you sure you're all right?"

River nodded stiffly and stood.

"I'm going to go make some tea."

"Tardis'll be fixed in about ten more minutes I'd say. Half the work was finding that fuse—remind me to go back to the Tardis graveyard where House and all the Time Lord distress calls were. If I go back to just after I left, then I can grab a few spare parts. It'd help keep the old girl in repair; usually I jury-rig it all together, but having those parts could be useful later on."

River nodded absently, already halfway out into the corridor. As she padded off, the Doctor peered after her. He looked up at the central column of the Tardis.

"Are you worried about her too, Sexy? She seems…off as of late."

The Tardis hummed reassuringly at him.

"I know, I know, she's a big girl. But something's not right. I'm actually all right with going to see Amy and Rory if it means I can work out what's the matter."

The Tardis hummed at him again and the Doctor smiled. He welded two wires together and wrapped the repaired area in blue electrical tape to mark where a repair had been made. Half the wires under the Tardis were marked with one or another color of tape. The Doctor mentally estimated how much time re-wiring the whole system would take and whether or not it would be worth it. After deciding that it _could_ be worth it, he resolved to save that project for a particularly dull day…like a Thursday.

The Tardis hummed and the Doctor grinned, gently patting the wall.

"You're a good 'un, old girl."

Clambering up to the console floor, he raced over to the console itself and flicked a few switches, threw a lever. The Tardis began to dematerialize, making that characteristic sound, the one little Melody Pond had once described as 'a robot with pneumonia.' She was working again. The Doctor smiled again, fondly patting the console.

"You're a wonder, love."

River reappeared in the console room as they landed. She looked a bit calmer, but her forehead was wrinkled up like it did when she was worried sometimes. He didn't say anything, but silently he wondered what was wrong. He wanted to wrap her up in his arms and hold her until the worry faded from her eyes and she was normal and River-y again. That didn't seem to be a plausible option, as she didn't seem to like being touched at all of late.

There was an urgent knocking on the door and the Doctor peered out.

"Oh hello Rory, Melody isn't here, is she? I've got River with me."

"No," Rory's voice replied, puzzled. "She's at her grandparents' house for the weekend. Amy and I were going to have a weekend to ourselves."

"Well I've brought River. Have you done the picnic in Paris yet?"

"Yes."

"Have you done the Praei yet?"

"Yeah, last month."

"Oh excellent; don't freak out when you see her now, okay?"

"Why? Is River all right?"

Rory barreled past the Doctor and rushed into the Tardis. River smiled at him, and Rory looked her up and down.

"You look lovely, River."

"Hi Daddy," she said softly, and Rory strode over to her and wrapped her in his arms.

"Hello Melody," he replied, pressing a kiss to her hair. "How do you feel?"

"Tired," she said. "Ready for all of this to be over."

"How much longer?" Rory asked.

"Seven or eight weeks; Grandma said it looks like Time Lords carry for ten months instead of nine because there's more to develop."

Rory winced,

"Your mum is going to go ballistic, I hope you know that."

"Yeah, I know."

"She actually just made cookies if you want to go in and get some."

"Snickerdoodles?"

"Why don't you go find out?"

River kissed Rory's cheek and hurried out of the Tardis as best she could. Once she was out, Rory rounded on the Doctor.

"What's the matter with her?" he demanded.

The Doctor shrugged helplessly,

"I was hoping you could tell me—she's just been off recently and I thought it was about the baby, but she's having recurring nightmares and she hides them from me. I don't understand, Rory. Normally she can tell me anything except spoilers, but this is…different. She's not herself."

Rory nodded sternly,

"All right. I'm sure Amy will get something out of her. Now come on, I want you to see Melody's tree house. Let's give the girls time to talk."

XXXXXXXXXXXXXXX

In the kitchen, a very pregnant River sat at the kitchen table, eating snickerdoodles and drinking milk. Amy washed off a cookie pan and looked over at her daughter and rinsed the pan, putting the cookies on a plate before she sat down at the table across from her daughter, who was only a bit younger than she was right now.

"What's the matter, Melody?" Amy asked, putting a hand on the younger woman's arm.

River sighed and took a sip of milk.

"I keep having these dreams, Mum."

Amy took hold of River's hand comfortingly and turned so she was facing her.

"Tell me about them."

River sat back in her chair, setting down her snickerdoodle.

"Well usually it starts in a hospital, in the delivery room. I'm having the baby then and there and then I close my eyes, just for a moment, and when I open them, I'm still in the delivery room, but I'm not pregnant any more. The Doctor's there but he doesn't remember our baby. I leave the delivery room and go looking to find someone who can help me get the baby back and there's a nurse and when she turns around, it's a Silence. It tells me to forget, and then I wake up."

"How often are you having the nightmare?"

River rubbed her dark-circled eyes with her fist.

"Nearly every night; sometimes when I take a nap. It's not always the same dream but there's always a Silence and nobody remembers the baby, not even the Doctor."

"Have you told him about the dreams?"

River looked at the floor and Amy's voice grew stern.

"Why not?"

River shook her head, trying to find the words to explain.

"It's like…I can't tell him. He's worried about being a good father and taking care of me and looking after the universe and they're just nightmares. I ought to be able to handle them."

"Melody, you're exhausted. You don't sleep well and you can bet that he knows something is wrong. You're probably worrying him more by not saying anything than you would be if you did."

"What do I tell him? That I'm having bad dreams? What can he do about that?"

"Maybe nothing, maybe something; either way, he can be there for you. He wants to be there for you, Mels."

River smiled; she didn't mind her mother calling her Melody in times like this. It made her feel safe.

"I know…I just feel like I'm already a burden to him like this, like I'm holding him back. I don't want to add one more thing to his list of worries."

"Melody Pond," Amy began sternly, using her 'mummy' voice, "You need to tell him."

River nodded.

"I know, you're right."

"Good. Eat your cookies and I'll go see what those boys are up to."

XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX

Amy Pond strode out into her back garden where Rory and the Doctor were exploring little Melody's tree house.

"Look at this, she's written her name in Gallifreyan on the door!" the Doctor exclaimed. "Bless."

"You should see the telescope she installed up here," Rory replied. "She's got star charts in that box and doodles and equations all over the back of them. I can understand a bit of it from University, but Amy can't do any of it. She wasn't ever really good at maths."

"Are you boys going to come down from your tree house?" Amy called. "I've just made snickerdoodles."

"Snickerdoodles?" the Doctor cried excitedly. "Snickerdoodles are brilliant! I mean, the name itself is enough to make you want to eat them all, and then they've got the cinnamon and sugar on top and the little swirly designs and they're just the brilliantest cookie ever."

Amy rolled her eyes,

"Well your pregnant wife might eat them all if you don't hurry up."

The Doctor scrambled down the ladder and dashed into the house. Rory climbed down more slowly and then looked over at Amy.

"So what's wrong with her?"

"Nightmares," Amy said softly. "Like the ones she has sometimes now, only every night. The Silence take her baby away, just like they took her."

"That would do it," Rory sighed, scowling. "No little girl should have to go through what she did."

"No," Amy agreed, "But she's brave, our Melody. She's a superhero."

"That she is," Rory agreed. "That she is."

**Angsty/insomniac River is no fun, poor dear. Send her some love?**


	40. He Doesn't Carry A Sword

He Doesn't Carry a Sword

The Doctor bounded into the kitchen, spotted the plate of snickerdoodles, and snatched up two in one hand, yanking the refrigerator door open to look for milk. Finding it, he poured himself a glass and plopped down in a chair across the table from River, stuffing a cookie into his mouth.

She couldn't help but smile at him, just sitting there looking about nine years old with a milk moustache and his mouth full of cookie.

"Enjoying yourself?" she asked, amused, and he nodded enthusiastically.

"Snickerdoodles are most definitely the brilliantest cookie _ever_," he informed her.

"I'm sure," River replied.

They sat in silence, both ignoring the white elephant in the room until River said softly,

"The reason I've been off…I've been having nightmares."

The Doctor looked up, set down the rest of his cookie, and swallowed the mouthful he had.

"Nightmares about what?"

"The Silence," River said softly, eyes downcast. "They take our baby away and nobody remembers it but me."

The Doctor held his hand out to her, lifting her chin with two fingers so he can look into her eyes.

"May I see?"

Trembling a little, River nodded. The Doctor stood and moved closer to her, sat in a chair beside her, and turned it to face his wife. Carefully, he placed his hands on her temples and closed his eyes, searching.

"Remember it for me, or it's going to take me ages to find."

She closed her eyes too and took herself back to the hospital room, her feet in the stirrups, him sitting beside her. She was in the dream again.

The Doctor silently watched it all play out and when it came to the part where she usually woke up, the Doctor rested his forehead against hers, trying to comfort her.

"No, River. Don't stop it, all right? This is when you wake up; it's not when the dream is over."

River's eyelids twitched as the dream played on behind her eyelids.

_ The nurse turns to look at her and it is a Silence. In its palm, it cradles a white-blanketed bundle. It turns its dark pit-like eyes upon her, its voice like how she imagines Death will sound._

_**Forget**__._

_The hallway is spinning out of control and she is turning so fast that she closes her eyes to block out the spinning corridor. When she opens her eyes again she is in a tube, like the one her mother described waking up in after the Doctor revealed to Rory that she was a 'ganger and had been since before America. The light is blinding and she closes her eyes again, opens them._

_She is in the Tardis and it is quiet. Even the soft Tardis hum isn't present and River knows that something is not right. _

"_Doctor?"_

_He is there, at the console, shoulders drooping and head bowed. She can tell from the way he stands that something is wrong. His back is to her._

"_Doctor?"_

_He does not turn around._

"_They took our baby, River," he says, "They took our baby like they took you."_

"_No," she whispers and she looks at her belly—she is not pregnant. Her body is the sleek, sexy form that it was before she carried the Time Lord's child. Seizing his shoulder, she forcibly pulls him so he is facing her._

"_Doctor, we have to—"_

_He is a Silence and the lights flicker as he takes a death-rattling breath._

_**Forget.**_

_She screams and closes her eyes, opening them to find herself in her childhood bedroom. Toys and books are scattered all over the place. A younger version of her, maybe seven, with coppery-red hair just like her mother's is rolling a truck back and forth on the rug, making engine sounds._

"_Melody?" she asks._

_She knows that she can't be here, that crossing her own timeline is against the rules, but her younger self peers up at her._

"_Hello. They told me that you would be coming."_

"_Who told you that, love?" River bends down to be on the same level as her younger self._

"_The same people who told us everything when we were little—before we were ourselves again."_

"_What?"_

_River doesn't understand; she sits down across from Melody and picks up a colorful wooden block. It is one of those 3-D puzzles that you have to figure out the trick to before you can take it apart. She begins to examine it, tugging on the pieces, twisting and pulling to see what comes loose._

"_Who is 'they,' Melody?" she tries again, wanting to know why everything still feels so wrong._

"_Who __**are**__ they," a voice corrects her and her gut twists and churns because it can't be her, it can't be. She looks up and Madame Kovarian is there, silvery eye patch and all, just as she was when River was little and still called Melody Pond. _

"_No, you're not here. How can you be here?"_

"_I'm here to offer you a trade, silly child." Her tone is as metallic as her eye patch and as cruel as River remembers._

"_A trade? For what?"_

"_I do believe you've lost something."_

_Madame Kovarian produces the white bundle seemingly from nowhere and holds it up, peering mockingly down at the bundle before looking back up at River._

"_Oh, this is yours? Excellent, I thought we'd taken the wrong one." There are Silence flanking her and River looks down at her younger self._

"_Run, Melody. Run and go find Mum and Dad. Go hide!"_

_Her younger self peers up at her and replies in a sadly resigned tone,_

"_Why? I'm just a weapon. That's all we'll ever be, River. Her weapon."_

"_No," River whispers. _

"_She's right you know," Kovarian says. "You should really listen to her. You're built to kill, Melody Pond. We made you into a killing machine; you can't be allowed to have a baby. What will you do to it, Melody? Kill it like we wanted you to kill the Doctor?"_

"_I won't harm my child." She is whispering now, almost in tears, uncertain._

"_You will. Shall I tell you how?"_

"_Please," River begs, but she doesn't know what she's begging for anymore._

"_It will be safer with us."_

_River squeezes her eyes shut, wishing it would end. When she opens them, she is standing in the middle of nowhere, surrounded by a barren moor. There is no sound. The light is grey; the grass is dead and brown. Everything is still. In her arms, she cradles a bundle. _

_She carefully pulls the blanket away from her baby's face, peering down at the child. _

_The baby is pale, too pale, and her lips are tinged blue. _

_No._

_River drops to her knees, unwraps the child, checks for breathing and heartbeats. Her baby is as still and cold as the moor._

_No._

_Tears run freely down her cheeks and the baby is cold and still. The Doctor is over her shoulder._

"_River, you killed our child."_

"_No! I couldn't have!"_

_Madame Kovarian is in front of her._

"_You killed your own child, my soldier."_

"_No! I didn't do anything!"_

_Her younger self stands before her._

"_You should have listened to her, River. The Madame knows best. You're only a weapon."_

"_No!"_

_She squeezes her eyes shut, opens them. It is her and the baby, the lifeless child and the moor. They are alone. She is alone. She is meant to be alone._

_Tears run down her face as she stares at her dead child and all she can think is,_

I deserve this for trying to be anything other than what I was meant to be. I was meant to be a weapon.

_There is a Silence before her and River looks up at it, eyes pleading._

"_Please."_

_The Silence places an enormous hand on her head, its palm against her forehead. _

_**Forget**__._

_It is only her and the moor._

The Doctor held his hands to her temples for a few moments longer as the dream turned to dust and everything faded to blackness. He removed his hands from her head and took her hands in his own.

"River," he said softly, and she opened her eyes. They were tear-filled and terrified.

"I was made to be a weapon," she whispered.

"No, River. You were trained to be a weapon. I was trained a hundred thousand things on Gallifrey—following your training is your _choice_. You were made out of love and human-things on your parents' wedding night. Your mother named you Melody Pond; she named you to be a superhero."

River sniffed,

"Some superhero."

"River, dreams are often manifestations of our subconscious thoughts. You're worried about not being a good parent; you're worried that you might hurt our baby."

"I might! I'm not ready for this, Doctor! A baby is a little person and I could screw up its whole life with one little mistake!"

The Doctor chuckled softly as Amy and Rory came in through the kitchen door from the garden.

"Amy, Rory, have you made any mistakes, raising Melody?"

"Oh don't even bring it up," Amy groaned, flopping down at the table. "The things she gets away with sometimes, the things I've snapped at her when I was frustrated, the times I didn't punish her for doing naughty things, and we've spoiled her senseless on occasion. It's a wonder that she turns out all right."

The Doctor turned to his wife, smiling.

"See, River? We're going to make mistakes. But we'll learn and try and ask for help when we need it. I'm scared too, love. But we can do this together. We _can_."

River nodded hesitantly,

"They've been chasing me for my whole life, Doctor."

"And they can't anymore," the Doctor assured her. "You've grown up to love and to learn to choose for yourself when and why to fight. You're strong now, and when you're not, you know that I'll always be here to catch you."

There was a long pause as they sat there, just looking at each other, holding hands.

"If the two of you are done with your sappy exchanges," Amy interrupted, "Rory and I were thinking of having dinner out. River, you remember the place that Mr. Randal owns in town, don't you; the one he named after his wife?"

"Yeah, I remember Serena's Place," River replied. "They had chicken marsala like I've never had anywhere else. Best Cesar salads in the entire town as well."

"Would you like to go out to dinner? He had a non-alcoholic wine menu so you can have some if you like."

River smiled,

"That'd be nice."

"Well dinner won't be for another couple hours, so how about a game of billiards?" Rory offered and River grinned.

"You started teaching me before I could reach over the table."

"And you still can't beat your old dad."

"Is that a challenge?"

"If you dare to take it."

Rory and River rushed to the basement steps and thundered down them, clamoring for dibs on the good pool stick.

Amy rolled her eyes and followed them down, with the Doctor trailing behind.

Half an hour later, River banished the Doctor to sitting on the stairs.

"You can't possibly be this rubbish at pool! It's geometry and physics, and you're a _genius_ for crying out loud!"

"The balls just sort of go places!" The Doctor exclaimed helplessly.

"Great. You can watch. Dad, forget two-on-two. I'll take Mum, or you can both play me."

"You can have your mother; I can manage both of you."

"Don't be so sure, Williams," Amy teased, "You never know when you might lose."

"Mum, you're not going to cheat are you?" River whispered.

"What your father doesn't know won't hurt him."

"So yes."

"Yes. Don't worry; I'll mention it later after dinner. It's physically impossible for your father to be angry with at me while consuming pie."

River shrugged and they proceeded to beat Rory at three games of billiards before they went upstairs to play a rousing game of Trivial Pursuit, which the Doctor lost at and then complained that half the cards were wrong, so it wasn't really fair. Everyone pretty much ignored his protests and once they had finished clearing up, it was time for supper.

Back in the Tardis, River put on a rose-colored dress and a pair of soft, supportive shoes and met Amy by the door, the redhead in heels and a reasonably fitted green dress with a flaring skirt. There was a jade clip in her copper hair. Rory wore a suit jacket and the Doctor stuck to his tweed-and-bowtie ensemble.

River ordered chicken marsala and then proceeded to order _for_ the Doctor to avoid confusing or offending the cook. He sulked for a bit, but excitedly discovered that he very much liked the fish and vegetables that River had ordered for him and instead amused himself by humming an off-key rendition of one of Mozart's sonatas under his breath while chewing green beans and parsnips.

Happily, River indulged in some of the non-alcoholic wine and ordered a large chocolate mousse for dessert. The rest of the table ordered pie. During the eating of the aforementioned pie is when Amy told Rory that though River had been playing fair, she had cheated at all the rounds of billiards that she and her daughter had won as a team. Rory looked mildly annoyed but mostly amused. Also, his mouth was full of pie, so satisfaction seemed to be the predominant emotion.

The restaurant had a little dance floor off to one side and the couples swayed there for a while after wine and dessert (or in the Doctor's case, no wine, only dessert.) River could feel the worry melting off of her and they ended the night with hugs and kisses in the back garden before the Ponds returned to their home and the Doctor and River to the Tardis, promising to return when the baby was born. They all went in.

River showered and changed into her pajamas, intending to go to bed immediately. The Doctor was perched on their bed when she got out of the shower.

"Will you wait up for me?" he asked. "I just want to take a shower."

She wrote in her baby journal, then her blue Tardis journal, recording her day with the Doctor, the nightmare, the night on the town, the billiards in the basement. She was just finishing up when he emerged in a towel and changed into clean boxers and a loose shirt with a somewhat clever slogan about theoretical physics on the front.

"If you have that dream again," the Doctor said, climbing into bed beside her, "Wake me up."

River nodded and kissed him good night.

"I will."

"I'll be here, no matter what, River."

"I know you will."

And they slept.

XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX

_In her arms, River Song cradles a little blanketed bundle. She is sitting in a rocking chair and rocking back and forth, back and forth, peering adoringly down at her baby. The tiny squashed face blinks up at her with liquid blue eyes—the doctor that delivered it said that the baby's eyes would probably change within a few months—most human babies were born with blue eyes. River runs a finger down the bridge of the baby's nose, gently tapping the tip._

_ "Why won't you go to sleep, little one?" she coos softly. "You're not meant to be awake at this hour."_

_ Her child blinks those enormous blue eyes at her again. She doesn't know how she could possibly love this baby so much after scarcely knowing it for a week, but she does. She would fight armies single-handedly, would break into a hundred thousand vaults, would take on any challenge the universe could throw at her to keep this child safe. She had been worried about motherhood, but she is a lioness, wild and fiercely protective of her baby. There was no need for her to worry._

_ "How about I tell you a story, little one?" she asks the child. "Would that help you to sleep?"_

_ The baby yawns, the tiny pink mouth opening, the perfect little tongue nestled in between the toothless gums. The Doctor's child is most beautiful baby in the universe, River is certain of that._

_ "There is a man, little one, one of the best I've ever known. He is the Oncoming Storm and Mighty Warrior and the Wise Man, the Healer. He is the best of all men and the worst of all men. He defends planets and universes and time itself and he never ever gives up on people. He does battle on every field, but he does not carry a sword, my love. Because as mighty and strong and great as he is, this man does not kill without reason or purpose. He is a mighty man, perhaps the greatest you will ever meet, and he loves, dear one. He loves and he fights for every single person's right to be free and to not be taken advantage of. He fights against tyranny and for justice. And he will always always fight for you, little one. He will always come, he will always protect you. Your father, the man who was once the last of the Time Lords, isn't alone anymore. And he loves you so much more than you can fathom. He's loved you since before you were born and he will love you after you grow old and die. He is everything to me, my love. And one day he will be everything to you too. Our Doctor—the man who fights for what he loves and cries for his enemies. He is a king among men, little one. And he loves you. Don't you ever forget that he loves you—and so do I."_

_ The baby's eyes are closed now and River sighs with relief. Gently, she sets the baby down in the little cot with Gallifreyan written on the sides and a mobile of stars hanging above. There is a soft noise behind her and the Doctor is there, standing in the doorway of the nursery._

_ "You really do give me too much credit," he says quietly, so as not to wake the baby. River smiles and walks into his arms. _

_ Sweetly, she kisses the man who runs, the man who fights, the man that will love her and their baby until the end of time itself and long after that. And he kisses her back._

In her sleep, River smiles and rolls over, snuggling herself back into the Doctor's waiting arms. Tonight, she has no nightmares.


	41. A Bit Too Early

A Bit Too Early

**Disclaimer: As much as I love/enjoy/tolerate all the authors/poets I quoted, their work does not belong to me. That said, BBC owns Doctor Who and all the canon characters. I own the unborn Time Tot and Rory's parents.**

They parked the Tardis at Cardiff to let the old girl charge and had a lazy day. River was still worn out from the several weeks of nightmares and insomnia so they mostly sat in the library and took turns reading to each other. The Doctor liked to play a game where one of them read a poem or part of a story and then the other person had to guess what they were reading. It was River's turn.

"My mistress' eyes are nothing like the sun," River began and the Doctor immediately snapped,

"Shakespeare. Come on, River give me something harder."

"When carrying out deviations in the Propositional Calculus, one quickly invents various types of shortcut, which are not strictly part of the system."

The Doctor paused for a moment.

"Hofstadter—an American; the book was entertaining but wrong on a lot of counts. It was clever for his _time_, I suppose. Give me another."

"I shut my eyes and all the world drops dead; I lift my lids and all is born again."

"Hmmmm…Sylvia Plath. Lovely woman, bit depressed. Shut her head in an oven and committed suicide, poor thing."

"The highest Petersburg society is essentially one: in it everyone knows everyone else, everyone even visits everyone else."

"Tolstoy, River. Try something _difficult_ this time."

River rolled her eyes and glanced at the Doctor. His eyes were closed so he wouldn't cheat and his face was serene. She liked seeing him this way, all calm and care-free. There was a hint of a smug smirk at the edge of his mouth, but being the vainest man in the universe just sort of came with the bit about him being the cleverest man in the universe. She rifled through the stack of books they had selected at random off the shelves and she flipped through one of the poetry anthologies.

"Or, if to touch such chord be thine,

Restore the ancient tragic line,

And emulate the notes that rung

From the wild harp, which silent hung

By silver Avon's holy shore,

Till twice a hundred years rolled o'er;

When she, the bold enchantress, came,

With fearless hand and heart on flame!"

The Doctor thought for a moment.

"Sir Walter Scott; that's Marmion, isn't it?"

"Yup."

"He'd be fun to visit, don't you think?"

"It'd be a nice, peaceful visit, wouldn't it?" River asked.

"What could go wrong?"

He couldn't see the glare through his eyelids, but he could feel it.

"All right, it's me so there's a chance that something will go wrong, but it's a _poet_, River!"

"Is there anyone who wants to kill you during his time?"

The Doctor shrugged,

"Don't think so. We can go another day. Now try another. Try something really obscure."

River picked up another book and rifled through it. In the back was a folded piece of faded notebook paper. She unfolded it and written upon it was a poem in black ink, unfaded and sharply contrasting the paper.

"He runs like the wind, trying to save them all

So desperate not to be all alone

He doesn't lack courage, or brains, or gall

Time's unofficial king, a box his throne" River began, and the Doctor sat up, his eyes flying open.

"Where did you find that?"

"Let me finish," River ordered, and he lay down, his face no longer serene, but puzzled instead.

"The last of his kind, so great to behold

But an outcast, a thief, advent'ring man

He sees time like a road, streaming from old

Exploring its pathways, fast as he can.

Dearest Doctor, some things you do not know

Things you learned at the End weren't as you thought

You're not yet ready, you still have to grow

Water's not washed up the knowledge you sought

Once the Noble's released, the time draws near

Age's last words will become ever-clear."

At the bottom of the page in swirling cursive, the poem was signed. River studied the clean, round looping letters of the poet's name, wondering.

"This says Charlotte Jay," River said. "Doctor, who is she? How does she know so much about you?"

The Doctor rubbed a hand over his forehead.

"It was when Rose was still with me," he began. "She and I were just sort of mucking about, wandering in London and we stopped for chips. We sat down to eat them in this little nook with a couple trees, it was near the Thames, and there was a girl, a bit older than Rose, just lying out on the lawn in the sun. Once we sat down, she looked over at us and smiled, but didn't say anything. When I got up to leave, she ran over to us and gave me this. I read it and looked up at her, and she just smiled at me like she was giving me the world's greatest gift. 'I know the iambic pentameter is off,' she said to me. The girl hands me a sonnet all about my life and my personal future and she's worried about the iambic pentameter—it's almost typical of the sorts of people I associate with. So I start to ask her what it means, but she just smiles again, like her whole self is lit up from the inside. 'Put it away somewhere,' she tells me. 'Just keep it in your blue box in the library and leave it for a while—you've still got some time before this, but I don't think I'll get another chance to give this to you.' I asked her what she meant, if she was sick, and she smiled that smile at me again. 'Silly old man,' she laughed, 'do you think I could ever catch you? Oh, and if you remember, tell the Captain that I'm all right, that I made it back safely. It was quite an adventure.' And I looked back at the poem and looked up at her and she was walking away. Rose chased after her and caught up, but the only thing Rose told me was that Charlotte had said was that one day I would understand."

River nodded slowly.

"She was from your personal future, wasn't she?"

"Apparently, but she was cryptic. I mean a sonnet? She could have just left a note and she chose to write me a prophetic sonnet?"

River shrugged and was about to read over the cryptic poem again when there was a loud knocking sound echoing through the Tardis.

"Someone's at the door," the Doctor said, and they both got up and wandered through the Tardis and to the door. The Doctor opened it and was met by Jack Harkness carrying a large blue gift bag.

"Let me see the little man!" he exclaimed.

River and the Doctor exchanged confused glances.

"Little man?"

"Your son, Doctor! You promised that your next visit you'd bring him and here you are!"

It was at that moment that he noticed River's belly.

"You're early, aren't you?"

"We're having a boy?" River asked.

"Wait…which baby is this for you?" Jack asked.

"We're having more than one baby?" the Doctor asked, looking faint at the very idea.

Jack looked from the Doctor to River and back again.

"Oh….first kid...I see. Well, seeing as you said that the first one was a surprise, no spoilers from me. Um…just pop in with the little tyke when it arrives, okay? And um…I'll just go now. Nice seeing you Doctor, River."

Carrying the blue gift bag, Jack strode out of the Tardis and didn't look back. The Doctor closed the door and turned to his wife, looking shell-shocked.

"So…we're eventually having another child."

"It seems that way."

"And at least one of our future kids is going to be a boy."

"That would also seem to be the case."

"…Are you _sure_ that Alonzo is out as a name?"

River turned and walked back to the library refusing to dignify his inquiry with a response.

**So there's a spoiler for you! This little baby isn't the only one they'll ever have! And they'll have at least one son between their multiple kids! Also, I wrote the sonnet and it is 100% copy-written. The pair of them are going to pick the poem apart in the next chapter but until then…who wants to guess/psychoanalyze poetry in the hopes of revealing spoilers? You may do this in the reviews if you wish; you can't spoil anything for me—I'm the author. ;)**


	42. His Rules

His Rules

**If I combined all the theories about the poem, then you guys got NEARLY everything I was referring to. It was pointed out that I was a bit obvious but it's a SONNET. I work with what I've got! So thanks for all the reviews and speculation! (Also, this chapter is filler and fluff. Forgive me.)**

The Doctor and River sat beside each other in the library; minds spinning from Jack's little 'revelation.' River peered down at her enormous belly and stage-whispered in Gallifreyan,

"Please be a girl; your Daddy needs to be wrong more often in his life."

The Doctor shot her a look and directed his attention to her belly as well.

"You be whatever you want to be, Alonzo."

"We are _not_ naming our future-son Alonzo, whether it's this baby or not!"

"It's such a cool name, though!"

"NO."

"Please?"

"No."

"I'll stop wearing fezzes. I'll never wear another crazy hat again!"

"Never?"

"Never ever; a silly hat shall never again grace this fine skull."

"Still no."

"Come on, River! Please?"

"We are not naming our son Alonzo. This discussion is over. Can we please redirect our attention to the poem?"

"Right; Charlotte's poem…Alonzo."

"I swear if you say that name one more time, you won't be able to assist in the conception of another child."

The Doctor sulked a little.

"Touchy."

_He runs like the wind, trying to save them all_

_So desperate not to be all alone_

_He doesn't lack courage, or brains, or gall_

_Time's unofficial king, a box his throne _

"This bit is obvious," River said. "It's about you."

"I'm not Time's unofficial king!"

"You sort of are the king of time; you're a lord of it at least and king isn't a far stretch seeing as you're the only one left. Well…you were at the time this was given to you."

"All right, you have a fair point."

"Thank you."

_The last of his kind, so great to behold_

_But an outcast, a thief, advent'ring man_

_He sees time like a road, streaming from old_

_Exploring its pathways, fast as he can._

"Again, this is all obvious stuff," the Doctor said. "I don't know why she bothered with it."

"Well, I can think of a couple reasons," River told him. "For one, she had to prove that she was talking specifically about you. The first two stanzas establish that."

"But she names me in the third stanza! What's the point?"

"There are other doctors in the universe; but you bring me to the second reason—it's part of the way you write a Shakespearean-style sonnet. There's a twist at the beginning of the third stanza, or a change in the poem."

"She said the iambic pentameter was off, why would she bother with the twist?"

"Because it's an essential part of the sonnet; also, iambic pentameter is hard."

"No it's not; I can rattle something off right now!"

"It's hard _for most average humans_."

"Well that's their problem, isn't it?"

"I swear, if I hadn't married you, I'd have shot you long ago."

_Dearest Doctor, some things you do not know_

_Things you learned at the End weren't as you thought_

_You're not yet ready, you still have to grow_

_Water's not washed up the knowledge you sought_

"The End," the Doctor mused. "What end would that be? I mean, it's capitalized so it's important, but I've been to a million things ending."

"What's the biggest one?"

"Biggest doesn't mean most important."

"Humor me."

"Well I've been to the end of the universe."

"And?"

"That's where the Master was and the people looking for Utopia."

"But the Master was disguised as Professor Yana."

"Yes."

"And they didn't find Utopia; they came forward in time to Earth."

"Yes."

"I'll get back to you on that. The whole bit about you not being ready seems straightforward though."

"Yeah…the bit about water and knowledge…the only water in the forest is the River."

"But we're not in the forest. And my mother is Amy Pond. Ponds have water too."

"But Amy didn't give me any knowledge."

"She gave birth to me and I gave you knowledge."

"Well either way, it's referring to one of you."

"Mum will be thrilled that there was a prophesy about her."

"It might be about you."

"Maybe, but she'd get a kick out of it."

"Yeah…Amy would enjoy that…"

The Doctor chuckled, picturing Amy's excitement about being 'foretold of.' It was exactly the sort of thing that she would love.

_Once the Noble's released, the time draws near_

_Age's last words will become ever-clear._

"Once the Noble's released…" the Doctor mused. "Donna wasn't released though; she was taken away, made to forget."

"What about a Noble corporation or a Noble cause or one of her family members?"

"I didn't know any of her family really except her grandfather."

River looked over at him as understanding washed over his face.

"What?"

"Once Noble's released…" the Doctor said, repeating himself, the comprehension clear in his tone.

"Yes?"

"Wilfred, Donna's grandfather. I mean his last name was Mott, but he was in the one door and I was in the other and I let him out, I released him. And I absorbed all that energy, which is why I regenerated!"

"So…she's talking about this incarnation of you?"

"Looks like it."

"What about Age's last words?"

"I've never met age itself."

"What about someone really really old?"

"I'm really old; your dad was really old before I restarted the universe."

"Yeah, but neither of you are age. We need to go older."

"Um…the Face of Boe? He's the oldest thing…ever I suppose."

"The prophecy," River whispered. "You were him, weren't you? You were the traveler like him that he spoke his dying words to, weren't you?"

The Doctor's face lit up again.

"River Song, you're absolutely brilliant. I couldn't have thought it better myself. Of course!"

"What?"

"Do you know what he told me, River? He told me four words: You Are Not Alone. It all makes sense now! The things at the End weren't as I thought at all! Professor Yana, the Master, was a Time Lord. I thought it was because of him that I wasn't alone! But what if the Face of Boe didn't mean the Master? What if he was referring to our children?"

"That would be so very _Jack_, giving me spoilers like that."

"So he broke your rules about spoilers."

"Apparently, and so did Charlotte Jay, whoever she is."

"I suppose that's a spoiler too, eh?"

"And you found the poem a bit too late for it to be useful to me…funny how she gave it to me a bit too early and it was rediscovered a bit too late."

River nodded.

"I suppose things work out the way they work out, huh?"

"Yeah…like names."

"We're NOT NAMING OUR BABY ALONZO!"

The Doctor pouted.

**So you were right about nearly everything! The Noble referred to Wilfred, not Donna, but same difference. (I know, his name is Wilfred Mott but it was close enough. I mean, it's a SONNET! Give me a break!) Speaking of breaks…I know I left you guys a bit ago, but I'm leaving on Wednesday to go to a wedding. So I'm driving for 2 days, attending the wedding, then driving back. Don't expect any new chapters until at LEAST Monday. And I'm starting my first official (non-training) day on the job tomorrow so wish me luck in that and in finishing the wedding gift on time! Ciao!**


	43. A Time Lord is Never On Time

A Time Lord is Never on Time

**I know I know, I've got some 'splaining to do. There was work and then I've been helping build a house for this family and volunteering until 1 in the morning so I've been really busy…sorry, but it was a really important project. The house is all finished and looking amazing, so your chapter is here now! Please don't eat me. *meep***

The planet was earth, year 350 BC or so. The Doctor landed the Tardis in Greece and had wheedled Aristotle (whom was apparently friends with the Doctor) into having a picnic lunch with him and his extremely pregnant wife. Aristotle brought fresh-baked bread and olives. River picked up a roast chicken from the 21st century and some napkins. The Doctor brought an enormous package of jammie dodgers. It was an odd sort of picnic lunch for Greece of 350 BC but it suited the company just fine. Aristotle was passionately fond of jammie dodgers since the Doctor had given him some several years previous to this particular meeting.

Lounging on the grass, River looked over at the famous philosopher,

"So do you have a wife?"

"I did," Aristotle replied somewhat sadly. "Her name was Pythias."

"Sorry to hear about that."

"It's all right," the man dismissed her pity with a wave of his hand.

"We are dust and to dust we shall return," quoted the Doctor and Aristotle looked over at him.

"I rather like that, it's quite good."

The Doctor shrugged,

"It's from Genesis…but you sort of have to know how to read Hebrew, which I'm guessing you don't know how to do."

Aristotle raised an eyebrow at him,

"All high-and-mighty, aren't we?"

"Well I am pretty brilliant."

"I've had a new idea or two in my time," Aristotle said mildly and the Doctor gave him the same dismissive wave that Aristotle had given River.

"Yes you're very clever for _your time_."

"All right then Doctor, answer me this: how do the pits get inside olives?"

He spat an olive pit into his hand and held it out to the Doctor, who stared at it in wonder, and then looked back at Aristotle.

They both stared at the olive pit for several minutes while River rolled her eyes and munched on a chicken leg. There was an odd, but not really painful, cramping in her lower belly. But it couldn't be…it was too soon.

"Doctor!"

"Not now, River. Aristotle may actually be a genius. How _do_ the pits get in there?" He picked up an olive and peered intently at it.

"Doctor!" she said, loudly and more insistently.

"Not just now, River. I may have hit on the greatest mystery of the universe."

"_Doctor_!"

There must have been something in her tone because the Doctor looked up, saw the chalky coloring of her face, and leapt to his feet.

"Oh Rassilon—you're in labor, aren't you? We're having a baby in ancient Greece. What do we do?" He stood up, looking pale and panicked.

"Okay don't panic! Nobody panic! Let's all just stay very calm!" He was shouting by this point.

"Doctor," River said quietly.

"Not now, River! I'm trying to work out where we're having my baby in the middle of ancient Greece! Where's the Tardis? I'll get the Tardis, that's it! Your grandmother said that labor took hours! Still, I'll run! Be back in a moment, River! Stay here! Don't panic! Don't have the baby without me!"

He dashed off towards where he had parked the Tardis. After he had gone, River looked over at Aristotle.

"May I have an olive?"

"False labor pains?"

"Yup."

"Why didn't you say anything?"

River shrugged.

"Tried, was ignored. Besides, the panic is good for him." She popped the olive into her mouth and chewed, spitting out the pit.

"So what's your opinion on female senators?"

And they began a very intelligent and civil discussion which lasted about twenty minutes, when they were interrupted by the Tardis landing.

The Doctor burst out of the doors of his machine and practically bellowed into Aristotle's face,

"Help me get her into the Tardis!"

River popped another olive into her mouth, spat out the pit, and paused.

"Doctor, I'm all right."

"Of course you're not all right, you're having a baby!"

"No I'm not."

"What?"

"I tried to tell you earlier, but you were panicking."

"I wasn't panicking."

Aristotle snorted,

"Yeah; calm as a hunted rabbit."

River patted his knee and he sat down beside her, looking a mixture of relieved and shell-shocked.

"You'll do better next time, I'm sure."

"Next time?"

"Well I have to deliver the baby at some point."

Her husband, now looking a bit pale and drained, popped another olive into his mouth and spat the pit into his palm, staring at it in exhausted wonder.

"There's got to be some sort of magic to it."

River rolled her eyes.

The next day they were browsing the library of Alexandria. Despite having been there numerous times, they still loved it. River adored libraries, an adoration that would one day get her killed. But despite the gnawing reminder every time they visited, he took her back again and again to watch the reverent way she stroked the scrolls and ran her fingers down psychically translated lines of ancient Greece, drinking everything in. It was almost masochistic, bringing her here so much, but she loved it and he couldn't bear to give her a moment of unhappiness, especially then, when her belly was full and round like a ripe peach or the moon. When her feet and back ached, when she worried about their baby, when she tossed and turned with nightmares, he didn't think it fair to take away this simple, safe joy.

When she was here, reading and discussing things with him in Gallifreyan, it seemed both joyful and painful—it made him apprehensive as he wondered when she would die. When she would leave their child behind. And he realized that he wouldn't—couldn't save her. He couldn't have a past, a _life_ without her. And he didn't want to lose this baby, this unborn delight that his heart seemed to be opening for. He couldn't bear to lose them both, even to save her. He wondered if that was selfish—though he reminded himself that she too had said not to rewrite their history, her now-future.

"Doctor?"

Her voice was gentle and he looked up at her amused expression.

"Yes?"

"You were thinking deep thoughts, love. Care to share?"

He lied, because she could never ever know what was to come for her. Leaning down to address her tummy, he said to her round, curving midsection.

"I was thinking about you, Alonzo."

River scowled.

"We're not having this argument again. And by 'not having this argument' I mean 'not naming our future son Alonzo.' Ever."

He grinned at her, and puckered his lips up for a kiss, eyes twinkling playfully.

"You're not bribing me into it either," she told him wryly, brushing a kiss over his puckered mouth.

She placed a hand on his shoulder, happy and amused, and with the other hand she held up an aquatic chart.

"See anything odd here?"

He studied the coordinates marked on the chart and converted them to the ones he was familiar with before grinning back at her.

"That's the proper distortion…but this isn't where Atlantis ought to be."

"The low-level psychic field distorted minute things around it…I'm surprised I even picked it up. I blame your influence."

She shot him a playful smile which turned into a grimace as her fingers dug into his shoulder as she placed a hand on her belly, the chart dropping to the floor.

"River?" he asked and quickly he lifted her up and carried her bridal-style back to the Tardis, though with a bit of difficulty as she weighed a bit more than she had on their wedding night.

Her grip on his shoulder loosened after a moment or two and she looked over at him.

"It's all right now—false labor again."

"How often is this going to happen?"

River shrugged.

"I've never done this before."

"Neither have I."

River snorted,

"I'm a bit relieved that you've never gone through labor before, love. If you had, I'd have cause for concern."

He smiled.

The false labor pains continued for a while, and though they were irregular, the Doctor became much more calm and reasonable during them. He was able to function and think rationally rather than run around screaming,

"We're having a baby in the middle of [insert location here]! What do we do? Where's the Tardis?"

She had Braxton Hicks contractions on six different planets and in four important events in earth's timeline. After that, the Doctor would never remember the crowning of Elizabeth V without recalling that River had been taking 'soothing breaths' as the newly crowned queen rode by on a genetically modified winged horse, and how she had been muttering,

"Not yet, not yet," under her breath in Gallifreyan as she stood stoically through what could have been labor, but wasn't.

It went on and they found themselves in the kitchen at midnight when River looked up at him, a look of confusion, excitement, and fear in her eyes.

"I think I'm in labor," she said, sounding a little breathless.

"What?"

"Yeah…the contractions are more frequent then the usual bits…I think we ought to go see my grandmother."

"You're nine months along, River! You aren't due for another month!"

"Tell that to the baby, Doctor."

He dashed off to the console room and in minutes, they were in her grandmother's back garden. The Doctor ran out into the house, grabbed Sophie by the arm and pulled her out of the house, past Melody Pond who was too consumed in cartoons to take much notice. Once in the Tardis, Sophie asked more questions that River was prepared for and when she had finished, River frowned at her.

"They stopped a bit ago. It felt like I was in labor…I thought I was."

"Braxton Hicks, dear; nasty little buggers. I had them with your father for nearly a month."

River sighed.

"I just want to have this baby, Grandma. I feel like a whale, I'm tired, my back hurts, the Doctor's being neglected…I just want to hold her or him in my arms."

"I know it seems like it's dragging by, but before you know it, your baby will be born, then grown, then off to see the world. It happens so fast, dear, you won't even believe it. You're probably not due for another month, if I had to guess. Time Lords seem to have a longer gestation period than humans."

River scowled and nodded. After ushering her grandmother out of the Tardis, River flopped into a chair.

"I'm going crazy here."

The Doctor kissed her forehead.

"We're all crazy right now, River. Parenthood is madness."

Smiling sleepily at him, she laid her head on his shoulder and closed her eyes.

"It's all so much to go through at once, Doctor."

"But you're not going through it alone."

"No," she agreed, "I'm not."

She went to bed.

The time seemed to drag by, and though they visited a dozen very safe places and had interesting adventures, River's thoughts were consumed by their baby. It seemed like anything and everything she was thinking of was about her unborn child. Her peachy baby-diary was read-through and the book on Time Lord pregnancies was like a bible for her. She had practically memorized the chapter on labor.

Though she knew that her baby wasn't likely to be born on the day that he/she was due, there was a calendar with big, red slash marks through each day that had gone by, with a day exactly fourteen days ahead circled multiple times.

"Two more weeks," she told the Doctor at breakfast. He had long since given up on reminding her that the baby wasn't necessarily coming on the due date. That particular morning, he merely grinned at her and said,

"A Time Lord is always on time."

River rolled her eyes, winced through another false labor contraction and took a bite of her scrambled eggs. The Braxton Hicks were normal by this point and she didn't even bother telling the Doctor when they happened because she didn't want him any more stressed than he already was. Though he tried to hide it, the Time Lord was apprehensive about the birth of his child. When she was sleeping, he tinkered with the Tardis more than usual—he was mildly obsessed with replacing the majority of the wiring. She tastefully ignored this project because she knew it was keeping him from going crazy. After breakfast, the Doctor took them to the asteroid that had once been House but was no more.

"Spare parts," he explained.

"So you're going to be wandering around for hours looking for usable parts in piled of junk?"

He thought for a moment.

"Yup."

River patted his arm, replying,

"I think I'll take this time to go shower."

They parted ways, the Doctor to find something to carry parts in, and River to the bathroom. She undressed, stepped into the shower, and pointed the showerhead at the shower wall, pausing for a moment to wince through another bout of false-labor pains. She turned the water on, letting it heat up. The baby within her kicked and there was a really weird lurching within her, and then a release. Fluid ran down her legs in a gentle trickle. In a flash she realized that she hadn't been having _false_ labor pains at all.

"_DOCTOR_!" she shrieked, and her scream seemed to fill the Tardis. He came running, shoving open the bathroom door.

"What? What is it? Are you okay?"

"My water just broke."

He ignored the fact that she was naked and standing in the shower, ignored the fact that he had gone through at least twenty bouts of false-labor that they had thought was real, ignored that he was supposed to be calm and cool. His face went very white.

"Labor—right. Labor. We're having a baby. You're in labor."

A contraction raced through her and she winced, bending over.

"This hurts a lot. I thought it'd be easier than this."

"Right—um…do you need something? Tylenol? To sit down? Do you want to sit down? Can I get you something? Are you all right?" He was babbling by this point, losing all sight of what he was meant to be doing, overwhelmed by the fact that his wife was in the early stages of delivering his baby into the world.

The Tardis lurched and began to move.

"You brilliant, sexy thing," the Doctor muttered gratefully, remembering that they weren't delivering the baby in the Tardis.

"I'm in labor, damn it! Can you stop flirting with a box?"

The Tardis forgave her because she was in labor. The Doctor looked a little taken aback, but nodded.

"Okay, let's get you out to your grandmother's. Can you get dressed?"

"I'm leaking!"

"Right…leaking; what can we do about that? Can we stop it up?"

"_My water broke! It's not like a wine bottle to be plugged up!_"

"Good, right…great. Not a wine bottle, got it. What do we do?"

At this point, River determined that her husband, though wonderful in a crisis, was absolutely useless during labor. She mentally resolved to have some sort of _useful_ person around during the later stages of her next pregnancy, whenever that would be. Jack had flat-out said that there would be another child, at least one other.

"Not a plug, can't use a plug," the Doctor said quickly, trying to work it out while simultaneously panicking.

In the end they put her shirt back on and wrapped her legs and belly in about ten towels before she was escorted out of the Tardis and into…a hospital.

"No, this isn't right," the Doctor said. "We're not meant to be here."

**AND THAT'S WHY IT'S CALLED CLIFF HANGER!**

**Muah ha ha.**


	44. With the Heart

With the Heart

The Doctor turned around to try and re-enter the Tardis, but it was locked. It refused to open at the clicking of his fingers and the lock sealed over, refusing to accept his key. They were alone on an alien planet in an alien hospital, possibly in danger.

He said an enormous amount of swear words then. Knowing every language there was, he was extremely capable of producing obscenities for every occasion and he certainly produced them then. He swore at the Tardis and the hospital and the universe and himself, all for being utterly useless. River winced through a contraction during the Doctor's extremely loud and rude rant, and once he had finished, she looked up at him.

"I need to get into a hospital bed," she told him, calm because she was in between contractions and her body wasn't currently a giant clenched muscle.

"I've been thinking about it…I'm having one maybe once every five minutes, and it lasts about a minute, and then goes away. I'm not ready to deliver yet, but I'd really _really_ like to not be standing anymore."

He marveled at how calm she was.

"Right, a bed," he said. "We'll need to check you in."

"Yes," she nodded.

This wasn't like the films he had seen with babies being born in them. In movies, the woman shouted about her water breaking and about five minutes later, she had a baby.

"How long have you been having these?" he asked.

"Regularly? I think it's been an hour and a half…they're what woke me up this morning but I guessed they were just more Braxton Hicks."

"Right, let's get you all checked in."

"You've got about three minutes before I have another contraction, so let's get this done."

She was so no-nonsense about the whole thing that he just felt calmer, more certain. This was normal and natural and it was going to be all right. Taking a deep breath, he asked an orderly for a wheelchair.

The orderly, who like all the other doctors, was covered from head to toe in hot pink scrubs, nodded. Literally no skin could be seen—he had no clue what planet they were on. He fished through his mind to try and work out which planets required full covering of their medical personnel, but then his wife was in a hovering chair and being escorted alongside him down to the check-in desk.

Once they emerged from the elevator, they were escorted to the check-in desk. The orderly there in the hot-pink looked up at the Doctor.

"Name, address, identification number," the orderly droned.

He sounded bored. How dare he sound bored when his wife was currently having a baby? This was possibly the most important moment in the orderly's entire life, seeing the first new Time Lord born in hundreds of years. He couldn't possibly be bored!

"Sir?" the orderly asked, managing to sound as though he would fall asleep any moment. "Name, address, identification number."

Scowling, the Doctor pulled his psychic paper out of his pocket and flashed it at the orderly.

"Here's everything you need. Now can we get my wife to a room please?"

"Of course, sir. Why didn't you just say so?" The orderly turned to the other orderly, the one whom had escorted them down to the check-in desk.

"Take her up to the delivery ward," the desk-orderly said bossily. "She needs to go see Doctor Hruush." (Pronounced: Hr-OO-sh)

"He's the charity doctor," the other orderly countered, confused.

"It's on the man's azulin' card. Are you going to tell him that he can't have whichever doctor he likes for his wife? He's the ambassador, for Ceru's sake!"

The non-desk orderly did a double-take and then nodded very rapidly.

"Right, of course. Off to see Doctor Hruush right away."

River gave a little whimper and bent over in her chair, muttering something under her breath in Gallifreyan. The Doctor listened harder and was able to make out that she was listing the various ways that she could kill him.

"All right, darling?" he asked a tad weakly.

"Shut up. You can just shut your enormous bloody gob."

He nodded quickly.

"Right, shutting up."

Once her contraction passed, she looked up at him.

"Sorry," she muttered.

"It's really all right. This is a lot of my fault."

"Let's be honest; it's not like I discouraged you…at all…ever."

He smiled, reminiscing a little.

"You're a wondrous thing, River Song."

She smiled.

"I know."

They arrived in the ward and River sat on her bed. The orderly looked over at her.

"Another nurse will be monitoring your contractions and once you're dilated enough, Doctor Hruush will come in and deliver your baby. Despite being a doctor for the poor, he is perhaps the best maternity and delivery doctor in this city, perhaps even this continent."

"Good to know," the Doctor told the orderly, and with a courteous nod of the head, the hot-pink-suited orderly vanished out the door and into the hall. He looked over at his wife, whom was looking rather white.

"It's really happening, isn't it?" she asked shakily, looking around the room. "We're having a baby. I'm delivering our baby."

"Yes you are; and you're doing a fine job of it."

"I don't want any drugs, remember that. I told you that already. Nothing."

He nodded, scooting his chair over so it sat next to her bed. Taking her hand, he squeezed it gently.

"I'm going to scream and I'm going to be in pain, Doctor. And I know that it kills you but you can't give me anything. It's not safe. We never determined what would and wouldn't hurt me or the baby."

He nodded again, squeezing her hand tighter.

"You're going to do great, River. You're strong and you're going to be brilliant."

She nodded and they sat there for a while until the next contraction struck. River listed every Gallifreyan obscenity in alphabetical order, then in order of offensiveness, then in order of personal preference. Once she had finished the third list, the contraction was over.

They sat in the hospital for maybe an hour before things began to pick up. During that time, the Doctor fished out a crossword book and a pencil and between her contractions, they did the crossword. River wasn't much good at putting it all together, but she wasn't bad with the clues. The Doctor wasn't terribly at it, nor was he brilliant. It was merely something to pass the time, like Tetris or advanced astrophysics. She walked around the room, as though she was a caged animal. He walked with her, and during contractions, she leaned on him, gripping his shoulder so tightly that he had to bite his lip to keep from crying out. After she nearly cut his finger on his wedding ring, clutching his hand through the first contraction, he wisely took it off his hand and slipped it into his right breast pocket, to avoid further damage to either of them.

The contractions got closer together and a nurse, this one the size of a child and dressed head-to-toe in yellow, periodically lifted River's legs and peered between them. Each time she did this, the nurse would hum in a mildly interested-sounding manner and then say calmly,

"You've got to dilate a few more centimeters, dear."

They got worse too. She no longer muttered Gallifreyan swear words, choosing instead to shout them.

"It hurts," she whimpered to her husband as her most recent contraction passed. "Doctor it hurts so much."

"I know," he told her as she climbed into the hospital bed. Smoothing her hair back with one hand, he cupped her cheek in the other.

"You're being so brave, River. You're doing so well."

She nodded as the yellow-clad nurse popped back into the room, carrying a cup full of ice water. River gulped it down and then crunched eagerly on the ice chips, enjoying the cool wetness sliding down her throat, soothing it. The nurse checked between River's legs again.

"Just a bit more, dear. Another centimeter or two and you'll be all set to deliver."

"Please, how much longer?" the Doctor asked.

"Hard to say; she's progressed well in the past hour. Maybe another hour of this?"

"Another hour?" River half-shouted.

"Would you like something to help with the pain?"

"No," the Doctor answered for her. "She's got a lot of…allergies. No pain medication."

The nurse nodded and walked out. Smiling weakly, the Doctor looked up at River, laying on the bed, sweat-soaked and looking generally miserable.

"Crossword clue?"

River sighed heavily and nodded, trying to be brave for him. The fact that he wasn't currently a nervous wreck was due to the fact that she had been holding back, keeping herself from showing how much it hurt, how each contraction felt like she was tearing in two.

"I've got to get my mind away from this. Give me one."

"All right, I need an eight-letter word for 'the higher social class.'"

"Nobility?" River guessed, and the Doctor penciled in the word, then nodded.

"Good; how about a three letter-word for 'exclamation of pain, perhaps Braveheart's cry.' That's a good one."

"Um…ow…yow…ouch, no that's not right…ach?"

"Ach…yes that fits wonderfully!"

Another contraction paused their crossword session and after it was finished, River shook her head, giving up on all pretenses. The last one had hurt so bad that she had nearly screamed, tears streaming from her eyes. They were in this together and she needed him. She couldn't do this alone and she had to stop trying.

"No more crosswords—I need you."

He set the book and pencil on her bedside table and gripped one of her hands firmly, smiling at her.

"I'm right here. I'm always right here."

It got worse after that. The contractions got more intense and she stopped swearing and just screamed, squeezing her eyes shut. Her nails cut into his skin and drew blood. When they were over, she would swallow and sink into the bed and pant, asking for water or something to wipe her forehead with.

The nurse returned several times and just when the Doctor was ready to pin her to a wall and tell her to deliver his baby and end River's suffering, the nurse looked up from between River's legs and nodded.

"You're just about ready to push, Mrs. Song. I'll go fetch Dr. Hruush now."

The yellow figure vanished and River squeezed his hand,

"I don't know if I can do this, Doctor. I don't think I'm ready to do this."

"You're going to deliver our baby and as soon as you hold the wonderful little child in your arms, I swear to you that you will forget all about this pain. You can do this, River."

She nodded and clenched his hand as her abdomen felt like it was on fire, like her hipbones were being slowly wrenched apart.

"Make it stop!" She screamed at him, "Make it stop, damn you!"

Taking a wavering breath, he held her hands as she suffered through the contraction and then fell limply back onto her pillows.

"How much longer?"

"I don't know, love."

"I can't. Doctor, I can't."

"You can, love. I know you can."

Dr. Hruush walked in. He was dressed in all white, every inch of skin covered.

"Mrs. Song, the nurse tells me that you're almost ready to push. Let's take a look, shall we?" He peered between her legs and the Doctor felt as though he ought to protest, but didn't. The man was a doctor.

"Looks like the nurse is right. The contractions are regular?" he asked the tiny yellow-clad nurse.

"Yes, Dr. Hruush; she's ready."

"Mrs. Song, have you felt any urge to push yet?"

River nodded, tightening as another contraction raced through her. She screamed and the doctor looked at the woman lying on the hospital bed, then at her husband, then at the nurse.

"All right Mrs. Song, not just yet. We're going to wait for the next one, and then I want you to push, all right?"

She fell back onto the bed.

"Push at the next contraction, got it." She took a deep breath and squeezed the Doctor's hand, which was mostly numb by this point.

"Here comes our baby," she whispered to him in Gallifreyan.

He took a shaky breath and nodded as she smiled weakly. Another contraction and the white-covered doctor was encouraging her to push. She was screaming and he was white as a sheet as she clung to his hand. The contractions came like waves on a shore and she screamed and pushed and the alien doctor told her she was doing well as her husband the Doctor wiped off her forehead and cheeks and assured her she could do this.

"It's going to kill me," she sobbed as the contraction faded, immediately allowing another one to build.

"No it's not."

"I can't do this, Doctor! I can't do this, I can't!"

"Come on, River. Yes you can. You're doing this right now. Push, River!"

"I can see the head," Dr. Hruush called and River gasped, fighting to think through the haze of agony. Please, couldn't it end? She couldn't take any more of this. She was certain that the next contraction would rip her apart.

"Come on Mrs. Song, one more good push and you'll have this baby in your arms."

She screamed, pushing as hard as she could, clutching her husband's hand. It felt like she was on fire, she had to be burning, it hurt so much. With a final push, she released her breath and then it didn't hurt any longer and after a long pause, there was a reedy wail, the cry of an infant.

"Oh God," River gasped as the white-clad man held up a red, weakly writing little creature.

"You've got to deliver the placenta, Mrs. Song," the nurse said, and she pushed again, and it hurt but her eyes were on the little red creature in his hands. He tied off the cord and offered a pair of scissors to the Doctor, who cut it. The little yellow-clad nurse wiped off the child and set the baby on River's chest.

"Hello little one," she whispered and realized that she was crying. "Oh I've been waiting so long to see you."

The Doctor had an awed look upon his face as River cradled the little baby. It had curling dark hair and when it blinked; its eyes were all hers.

"Doctor and Mrs. Song, your daughter."

"She's perfect," River whispered, "Oh God, she's perfect."

The Doctor reached out a hand and with a single finger, traced the bridge of his daughter's nose.

The nurse lifted the baby for a moment, swaddling her in a tiny green blanket before River lifted their daughter up and settled her into his arms.

"Say hello to your daddy, baby. Say hi."

He peered down at her little face, red and squashed and not all that cute, but to him, she was the most beautiful thing in the world. She was the most perfect thing in all of creation. She outshone every star he had ever seen, beat any adventure he had ever been on. She was the epitome of wonder, of perfection. It blew his mind that he and River, in their love, had created this tiny little person, this beautiful little wonder. He leaned down and kissed his wife, sweaty and exhausted but radiant.

"_On ne voit bien qu'avec le cœur,_" he murmured, awed.

"It is only with the heart that one can see rightly," River whispered, translating for him.

That was all that truly needed to be said for a long while.


	45. You Are Not Alone

You Are Not Alone

**She's going to be breastfeeding. Yes that means there will be breasts mentioned. Actually, seeing as she's never breastfed before, boobs are going to be a popular topic in this chapter. It's not a sexual thing, it's food. Let's be mature about this.**

"River, we _made a_ _person_," the Doctor whispered, handing the baby back to his wife, whom cradled their little daughter close to her chest.

"I know, my love." Despite the commonness of the phrase, her voice was full of wonder.

They were both entranced by their baby, which fell asleep on River's chest. In the Doctor's mind, he was singing with delight. That sense that told him there weren't any more Time Lords was no longer telling him that. Instead it sang of another of his kind, and it was the first time it had sang in hundreds of years. There surely wasn't a more beautiful sound in the universe.

"Can I take a shower?" River asked suddenly, looking up at Dr. Hruush.

"Certainly; we'll get you into the maternity ward and then you can shower and have something to eat if you like."

"Thank Rassilon," she said, picking up one of her husband's phrases. "I'm starving."

She was moved to a hover-chair and given a long smock to cover up the fact that she wasn't wearing pants. After the Doctor was given the location of River's new room, she begged him to run to the Tardis and pick her up clean clothes. He dashed off, doing as he was told.

He arrived in her room maybe ten minutes later. The white-covered doctor was sitting in a chair next to a little plastic cot on wheels, where their baby slept. River was nowhere to be found, but he could hear water running from a little room off to the side.

"You're looking after her until River's out of the shower?"

The doctor nodded and turned to look at the sleeping baby.

"She's a beautiful baby," he remarked. It struck the Doctor that this was an odd thing for an alien doctor to say, and that it was even odder that he had chosen to sit with the baby instead of leaving to go do medical things. Suddenly feeling concerned about his baby's safety, he walked over to the cot and rolled it closer to him, running a gentle hand up and down her little belly. The baby didn't stir, but he could feel her tiny heart beating within the little chest.

"What planet are we on?" he asked roughly.

"Crespallion," Dr. Hruush replied casually. The Doctor immediately relaxed; with the current technology and the planet now identified, this was probably one of the safest places that his baby could have been born. The hospitals of Crespallion were highly advanced and very conscious of patient-rights. Besides all that, there wasn't a war on Crespallion due for about a million years. They Crespallions were peaceful people, and he smiled.

"I was here less than a year ago," he smiled fondly at the memory. "There was this boy, and we found his family."

Dr. Hruush chuckled, pulling off his white face-covering. Underneath it was the blue and undeniable face of an older Suyo.

"It was less than a year for you, Doctor." He smiled at the Time Lord in a way both joyful and sad. "For me, it was a lifetime."

"Suyo," the Doctor said softly, smiling as he stroked the dark fuzz on top of his daughter's head. "You delivered our baby."

"You delivered _me_, Doctor. Your wife holding me while she sang a song about a blue boy is my first memory, and my faintest. But I always thought I'd see you again."

"Have you had a good life?" the Doctor asked.

"It's not over yet, but yes. I have a wife back home, and two children. I help the sick, and do as much charity work as I can. And I have a marvelous story for my children about a little boy who is taken away when he is very small and how kind strangers take him home again."

The Doctor smiled at the grown man that he had last seen as a helpless infant. Would his own daughter grow this quickly, an adult in the blink of an eye?

"You took what you were given and gave it to others," the Doctor remarked and the blue man smiled, revealing shockingly white teeth.

"How could I do anything else?"

"Anything else what?" River remarked as she emerged from the shower wrapped in a towel, her curls dark gold from being wet.

"River, I think you remember—"

"Suyo," she whispered, a wide smile breaking over her face. "My little blue baby."

Suyo Hruush laughed,

"I always thought you'd be glad to see me."

She smiled, glancing over at the cot where her daughter slept. It was odd, not being pregnant anymore. The fact that until less than an hour ago, that little girl had been inside of her belly was still a mind-boggling concept. She and the Doctor had made a person and it was incredible—_she_ was incredible.

"I'm going to get dressed," she told the blue man, and took the clothes that the Doctor offered her—yoga pants and a loose tee shirt. It wasn't her usual style, but she was tired and had wanted something that wouldn't cling or stick or rub or…really touch her more than necessary.

Both doctors—hers and Suyo—nodded as she disappeared into the bathroom to dress. When she emerged, she looked much happier and she climbed somewhat gingerly into bed, very sore from delivering her baby, whom had started to make little mewling noises, like a kitten. She scooped up her daughter and settled her on her chest, whispering soft comforting words in Gallifreyan to the child, whom continued the mewling noises.

"She's hungry," Suyo observed, and River managed to look a bit panicked.

"Um…I don't know how to feed her."

Suyo blushed purple and nodded awkwardly,

"Um, I'll go get the lactation advisor."

The Doctor looked at River, astonished.

"You're going to feed her?"

"Yes," she replied, sounding a smidge annoyed.

"With your…you know…"

"Breasts? Yes."

He looked curiously at her breasts and then at the baby cradled against her chest.

"So your…breast…is going to go into her mouth. And then milk's going to come out."

"Those are the basic concepts of breastfeeding, yes," River told him, sounding slightly more annoyed, but also mildly amused.

"Can I watch?"

River shot him a somewhat neutral glance, trying to figure out what he was thinking.

"Of course, but why?"

"I want to see how it works."

"Breastfeeding."

"Yes."

"You'll be working it out at about the same time as me; I only get the basic concepts."

A tiny nurse dressed in green skin-covering scrubs arrived in the room and gave her a five-minute lesson about breastfeeding. River nodded her way through it while the Doctor listened in the rapt, wide-eyed fascination of a child. He kept shooting looks at River's breasts, seemingly just then coming to the conclusion that they weren't just there to fill out her outfits and tempt him from their perch.

"They're useful," he whispered in awe as the nurse exited. River chuckled and rolled her eyes.

"They've always been useful love, now they just have a new use."

"I dunno, before they were all lovely and fun and now they're…baby-milk bags."

"Thanks, Doctor. I appreciate it being referred to as the lady with the baby-milk bags on her chest."

The nurse had closed the door and the Doctor drew a curtain around River's bed as she unwrapped her daughter, whom had apparently been put in a diaper while she was in the shower. Her husband certainly hadn't done it, so she assumed it was either Suyo or the nurse. She laid the baby on her stomach and peeled off her top, then her bra, looking down at her breasts.

"Hungry, sweetling?" she cooed to the baby, whom responded with the mewling cry. "I know, baby. I know. It's coming."

After several botched tries, both River and the baby were comfortably settled with the little creature suckling contentedly, her little fists working at River's breast. The Doctor watched in fascination.

"She knows exactly what to do," he said softly, stroking his daughter's dark fuzzy head.

River chuckled,

"What are we going to name her?"

"The Time Lord name or the human one?"

"Oh both…either."

"I liked Donna Rose, but it's not…right for her. It doesn't fit her."

"No," River agreed, "She's not a Donna."

"But I've got her Gallifreyan name," he said with a smile. "It took a lot of thought, but I've got it."

She looked up expectantly.

"Novaerosalucieleyantesei," he said, the syllables easy on his tongue. River smiled, cocking her head as her brain made short work of her daughter's name.

"Amy's never going to call her that."

"I never call you Melody," he pointed out. "You rarely use my real name, but we both know why that is. I just want her to have a piece of her culture. And she can choose when she gets older."

River smiled,

"That she can; if she's anything like you and I, picking what she wants won't be an issue."

He chuckled as River looked down at their child, love and protectiveness burning in her eyes.

"Aliya," she said softly. "Aliya Hope Song."

"Aliya Hope Song," he repeated softly, nodding his head. "It suits her."

As little Aliya/ Novaerosalucieleyantesei unlatched from her mother's breast and yawned, River put a rag over her shoulder and patted her back; she remembered how to burp a baby—she'd done a bit of babysitting to earn pocket money when she was a teenager.

Aliya burped and spit up onto the rag on River's shoulder.

"Is she going to do that a lot?" the Doctor asked, sounding both fascinated and a little grossed-out.

"Yes."

"Oh. All right."

The baby fell asleep on River's chest and she lay there for a long while, watching her baby sleep. She and the Doctor could have watched her sleep forever. She was their daughter, their Novaerosalucieleyantesei, their Aliya Hope Song.

And she was perfect.

**A FEW NOTES!**

**1. Novaerosalucieleyantesei—pronounced No-vay-rose-uh-loo-see-ay-ley-ahn-teh-see**

**2. Yes. I told you there would be boobs.**

**3. I contemplated spelling Aliya as Aliyah instead so if I randomly start spelling it with an h, it's because I either forgot or changed my mind. She's the same kid.**

**4. I don't intend on using her Gallifreyan name often. It's a mouthful and really long.**

**5. I named her Aliya because one of the meanings is Noble, so she's still named after Donna in a way. And Hope is her middle name because she's the first new Time Lord in ages and a hope for both the race and for the Doctor. **

**6. Address any other questions to me in the reviews.**


	46. Happy Baby Making

Happy Baby-Making

**This chapter partially inspired by tardisinthesgc's comment about the balloons. **

**ALSO: her name is pronounced uh-lee-uh. Yay for Aliya!**

Suyo returned an hour or two later, checking to make sure that River was clothed before entering. The Doctor looked over at Suyo Hruush, all grown up and a doctor as well.

"How long does she need to stay here?"

Suyo smiled.

"Twenty-four hours for monitoring and then you're all free to go."

The Doctor smiled and River, whom had placed little Aliya back in her cot, nodded sleepily. Between delivery and nursing, she was exhausted, even if it was mid-afternoon by this time.

"Are you going to see us out?"

"I'll see you to your blue ship if that's what you mean. I assume it's parked nearby?"

The Doctor nodded,

"Of course."

Suyo smiled,

"Well I'll see you tomorrow morning then. River probably needs some rest and surely you have something to do with your time."

The blue man left them alone, closing the door gently behind them.

Looking down at his daughter, he still felt overwhelmed. She was wonderful and tiny and perfect and he was still trying to come to terms with the fact that his DNA was entwined in hers and that she had been made by him and River. But despite the fact that his brain understood all the mechanics and biology of how this baby had come to be, she was still incredible and unexplainable. He didn't understand how after knowing her for only a few hours, he loved her with a fierceness that astonished him. It felt so good, so right, that she was there. It was like he had been waiting for her his whole life and here she was, beautiful and new.

He looked at the sleeping infant in the cot and whispered to her in Gallifreyan,

"Daddy loves you, Novaerosalucieleyantesei."

River smiled at him sleepily.

"Wake me if she starts crying, all right?"

He nodded, smiling at his wife.

"You did so well, River. She's absolutely perfect. You're brilliant."

Her eyes twinkled and she leaned over, wincing a little. She was sore, but with her daughter sleeping there, it was worth it. She gave him a kiss, slow and sweet, before she lay back down and closed her eyes.

He smiled.

"Sleep, love; you deserve it."

River slept. She had only been asleep for half an hour, when the door flew open, catching itself silently before it slammed the wall. A man with completely messed-up hair was clutching a bottle of what appeared to be fortivodka—which had at least triple the strength of 190-proof vodka. The bottle was half-empty and the man was singing something off-key and carrying an enormous bouquet of neon orange balloons and appeared to have a gift-wrapped package taped to his chest. There was a note scrawled on one side that said,

"For Songs—do not lose or gamble away."

The Doctor sighed as River's eyelids fluttered open. She looked at the man, groaned, rolled over, and closed her eyes again. Her husband looked up at the extremely drunk man and rolled his eyes, exasperated.

"Hello Jack."

Captain Jack Harkness puffed out his chest, clearly intending for the Doctor to take the gift taped to his shirt.

"Happy baby-making!" he announced loudly. In her cot, Aliya stirred, and then settled, still asleep.

"Jack," the Doctor whispered, "River and the baby are sleeping. You need to be quiet."

Jack lowered his voice to a stage-whisper, a grin splitting his face.

"You got her pregnant, you sly dog."  
>"Jack, we're married."<p>

Jack gave him an exaggerated wink,

"Right…you sneaky man, you."

The Doctor sighed and removed the box taped to Jack's shirt.

"Did you buy this before or after you started drinking the fortivodka?" he asked.

Jack licked his lips and let go of the balloon bouquet, allowing the neon orange balloons to dance across the ceiling.

"Well I got the vodka at the intergalactic supermarket, which I went to _after_ I taped the box to my chest…but _before_ I bought the balloons." He counted his actions off on his fingers. "I think I bought it before I got the vodka…yeah. I think."

The Doctor opened the box and peered into the box somewhat apprehensively. Inside was a plush white ball. He looked at it, then at Jack.

"A bit bland, but harmless and thoughtful…Jack, did someone else buy this?"

"Nonononono….you're stupid. Stupid Time Lord, you are. It's psychic and programmable, you numbskull." "Oh."

"Yeah, you thickety thickhead. It works like this. You stick it to your forehead and then you think of what you want it to look like. And once it's been programmed once, it sticks like that. It's like you can make a plush toy version of _anything_."

Jack eyed the white plush ball speculatively.

"Actually…can I have that back? I swear I'll have more fun with it than she will. Loads more fun."

"No," the Doctor said grouchily. He held the plush to his head and thought of Gallifrey, of an animal that Aliya could cuddle and love. Smiling, he brought to mind the image of a flubble. The ball shifted in his hands into a plush six-legged koala-like thing with a smaller nose. He smiled at the plushie and placed it in his daughter's cot at her feet.

"There you go, Aliya. That's from Uncle Jack."

Jack nodded slowly and his knees gave out. The Doctor plucked the bottle of fortivodka from his hand before it smashed on the floor. He eyed it and took a sip, then winced and spat it all over his passed-out friend.

"That's awful," he rasped at the now-unconscious Jack. After a moment, he eyed the bottle again.

"It's some sort of Earth tradition to drink when there's a child born, right?" he asked the passed-out Jack. For obvious reasons, the other man didn't respond.

"Well one sip then. And I'll swallow it, I swear." Wincing, he allowed the fortivodka to barely touch his lips and he made a face.

"Close enough."

He glanced down at the sleeping Aliya, then the passed-out-drunk Jack, then at his wife. He was a bit tired, but he felt that as the dad, he ought to stay up and look after his family…and also his drunken friend. He was so used to being a child, being the oldest man in the universe, yet simultaneously being about six. He wondered if this all meant that he would have to grow up. Part of him didn't mind, as he _was_ an adult, but part of him did mind growing up. Part of being the Doctor meant that he never ever had to grow up and he wondered if that part of him would cease to be.

He leaned over Aliya's cot.

"I'm going to be the best dad there ever was, Aliya," he told his daughter. "I swear, you may not always be happy with me, but I'll keep you safe and teach you about our people. You'll be raised properly."

He sat up for two hours, just thinking, when Aliya started making her little mewling noises again. The Doctor was about to stand and pick her up, but River's eyes flew open, though her baby hadn't been crying very loudly at all. She looked over at Aliya and scooped her up into her arms, cradling her with a gentleness and care that the Doctor rarely saw.

"Are you hungry, little one?"

She glanced to make sure the door was shut, and then at the still-unconscious Jack. After determining that he wasn't waking up anytime soon, she peeled off her shirt and bra once more and settled little Aliya against her. The infant burrowed her little face into her mother's skin and River carefully maneuvered her into a comfortable position before cupping her breast and helping Aliya get a good latch on it. Aliya made soft little noises before settling in to feed. The Doctor watched, fascinated still by the perfect little person that he and River had made.

"River, do you want something to eat?"

She nodded, only pausing to glance up from her baby for a moment.

"When I'm done feeding her, I'd love something to eat. What time is it?"

"Suppertime," the Doctor replied, smiling.

River smiled down at Aliya as her daughter's little hands flailed a bit, muscle control about zero.

"Suppertime for more than one of us," she remarked.

"Looks that way," the Doctor agreed.

It was silent for a while, except for Aliya's stomach gurgling and the breathing of the three adults in the room. It was broken by Aliya's satisfied sigh, a little huff of her baby lungs. The Doctor didn't understand how she could even sound fragile and innocent, but she did. River burped her and rocked her for a while, before the baby settled back down to sleep. She was picking up her bra and clasping it on, when Jack jerked, gasped and sat up.

"Death by alcohol overdose—done that before but _hello_ River Song that is one hell of a good morning," he finished, blinking at River's half-exposed breasts as she clasped her bra shut. The Doctor scowled blackly down at Jack, whom didn't seem to notice.

"I mean I knew that you had an absolutely lovely frame but woman, let me just say that the actual view makes what I imagined pale in comparison."

That was about when the Doctor seized him by the collar and hauled him up to his feet, growling into his face,

"I'm losing my patience, Jack."

Captain Harkness blinked cheerily up at the Time Lord, ignoring his threats completely.

"Take it as a compliment, my friend. I only get to look, but you're married to her. You've got an all-access pass."

"I think I'll decide who does and does not have access to me, thank you," River said primly, her shirt on again.

He grinned at her,

"Oh I bet you will."

The Doctor sighed and rolled his eyes; like it or not, this was Jack and Jack did as he liked. You could kill him for it, but in the end it didn't do much good.

"If you're going to hang around and catch up, do us a favor and get something to eat from the hospital cafeteria. The food here is actually decent, and that's a huge advancement. Hospital cafeteria food is historically the worst available, not including school lunches of course."

Jack nodded, swinging out the door,

"When I get back, you're introducing me to that baby. And also, I want to make sure I brought you the right gift. There was this wonderful gift shop woman and I'm not entirely sure what I bought for the baby."

The Doctor nodded dismissively and Jack swung out the door and into the hall. The Time Lord looked back at his wife.

"You see why I wanted to name her Alonzo instead?"

She threw a plastic tray at his head.

**Flubbles are canon Gallifreyan creatures. The Doctor kept one under his bed when he was in school. Google it and I swear you will find it.**


	47. Timelines and Friends

Timelines and Friends

Jack returned with a bag of greasy chips, a plate of tacos, and an enormous pitcher of lime-green liquid. River blinked at him as the Doctor rubbed his head, still whining about her hitting him in the head with a tray. They both looked confused as he set down the food on River's bedside table.

"The cafeteria was serving chips, tacos, and kiwi juice?" the Doctor asked.

"Of course not," Jack scoffed. "I got you _real_ food. No need to thank me."

"Sounds good," River said, "No thanks for Jack."

She picked up a taco and took an enormous bite out of it, before sticking her hand into the bag of chips and munching on a few.

"I've been _so_ hungry," she mumbled through a mouthful of tacos and chips.

Jack smiled, "Captain Jack Harness—delivery boy. And I don't just deliver food." He winked at her overdramatically and the Doctor growled at him deep in his throat. Jack chuckled.

"You're always so temperamental after she's given birth."

"Always?" the Doctor asked, puzzled.

"Yeah, which kid is this?"

"This is our first child."

"Aliya?" Jack asked delightedly, "I heard that I'd been there to visit, but I guessed it was later in my timeline. She's a good girl, Aliya."

River smiled at her sleeping daughter. The emotional moment was somewhat ruined by the fact that she was downing tacos at an astonishing rate. When Jack and the Doctor stared at her, she glared at them.

"Once _you_ give birth, then you can judge my post-delivery eating habits. Until then, stop giving me those faces." She popped a chip into her mouth and smiled. The Doctor helped himself to a handful of chips and munched on them while Jack peered down at little Aliya.

"She's a lovely baby, River. Looks like both of you. Your eyes, his hair, and I don't know whose nose this is."

"My mother's nose in her fifth regeneration," the Doctor piped up. Jack nodded,

"Well she's beautiful."

"Of course she is," River said defensively, "She's our daughter."

Jack chuckled and ran a gentle hand over the dark locks of baby Aliya.

"Yes she is."

After eating, River settled back into the mattress and the adults chatted about old times. Jack refused to reveal anything about their future children, except that they were the Doctor and River's children through and through. Jack graciously took his leave when Aliya woke and began to cry for food again.

"I'll see you two later," he said with a smile. "Oh and here's a tip—the next time you see me, slap me in the face. I'm going to need it."

With a wink and a flash of his vortex manipulator, he was gone, leaving the Doctor, River, and their daughter. The first Time Lord family in many years sat quietly in a hospital room as the baby ate and the Doctor dozed and River gazed adoringly at her infant.

Aliya ate and then slept and they sat up for a long while, even after the patient room lights had gone out, just talking, speculating about what she would be like.

River tried to go to sleep and eventually succeeded, but the Doctor sat awake. He could go for a few days without sleep and he didn't want the room unguarded. As happy as he was that he and River finally had their own child, he remembered the circumstances of River's own birth and all the people who wanted to take her. He didn't want that to happen to his own daughter. So as his family slept, he sat awake, keeping watch.

Aliya woke up to eat every few hours and River fed her, half-asleep until Aliya was in her arms and then she was wide awake. She knew that it wouldn't last, that she needed her sleep, but on her first night of motherhood, she barely minded being awoken by the baby. The Doctor sat silently through it all.

In the morning, Suyo Hruush bid them good day, standing beside the Tardis as it dematerialized. River sat in the Doctor's chair and looked around the Tardis, which settled herself in the vortex before humming questioningly.

"Ah yes. Sexy, this is Aliya Hope Song. Her Time Lord name is Novaerosalucieleyantesei. She is our baby."

The Tardis made a snort-like humming sound, as though this was obvious.

River looked over at the Doctor,

"Doctor, I just realized—the Tardis isn't in any way baby-proofed. I mean, I guess we don't have to worry until she starts rolling and crawling, but still. The Tardis isn't even safe for you, my love. How is it going to be safe for a baby?"

He smiled brightly at her.

"Love, we've got a few months before we have to worry about any of that. How about we start working on it once we've settled into a routine, eh? It's going to be exhausting around here for a while. Not to mention, your parents wanted to see Aliya."

River smiled,

"I'd like to spend some time here first—in the Tardis with you and the baby."

Sexy hummed approvingly and the Doctor patted her console.

"Let's get that old cot of ours out and settle her into in our bedroom."

They found their bedroom to be the first door on the left as soon as they got into the hall.

"I suppose Sexy moved it so it'd be easier for you," the Doctor remarked. River smiled and leaned against the doorframe.

"Thanks old girl."

The Tardis hummed contentedly as the Doctor fetched the cot that had held himself, his children, River, and would now hold his daughter Aliya. It wasn't too heavy, only large and a bit bulky, so he made his way through the halls, trying to avoid scraping the walls or the cot. The Tardis shortened the way for him and he was in his and River's room quicker than usual. Once he had set down the cot, he looked over at River, realizing something wasn't quite normal. Wrinkling his brow, he looked over at his wife.

"Something's different in here."

River nodded and the pair of them looked around. She spotted it first, a door right next to the bathroom door. It was painted white, and the paint looked fresh. Excitedly, the Doctor set down the cot, dashed across the room, and pushed open the door, turning the knob as he did. He looked around inside and called,

"River, come see this!"

She walked in after him, right into a nursery. The walls were peachy-pink and clean white furniture matched. There was another cot, but as the Doctor rushed out to fetch his, River watched the white-painted cot vanish as he came in with Aliya's cot. The Doctor set down the cot and looked up at the ceiling. Stars and galaxies glittered on the dark ceiling, and the Doctor blinked and rubbed his forehead.

"It's singing," he whispered, awed. "The Tardis is telepathically singing. It's not in Gallifreyan or anything, but it's music and I can hear it in here." He tapped his forehead.

River settled Aliya down into her cot and trudged back into their bedroom. The Doctor followed, leaving the door to the nursery open so they would hear Aliya if she woke and began to cry. River sleepily pulled off her clothes and walked to the shower. She was happy; there was no doubt about that. However, she was also sore from labor and delivery, tired from waking up every few hours to feed Aliya, and she had never liked hospitals, so she felt the need to wash the antiseptic-y smell from her skin and hair.

Leaving her clothes in a pile in the middle of the room, she shuffled into the bathroom and turned on the water, not closing the door in case Aliya woke up. She was steady and efficient, washing herself thoroughly but without any of the enjoyment or luxury she usually gained from taking a hot shower. She was simply too tired to enjoy it. After toweling off her hair and skin, she pulled on the first soft things she could find—one of his soft old tee shirts, and a clean pair of boxers—and fell into their bed. As soon as her head hit the pillow, her eyes shut and her mind dropped into sleep.

The next few weeks were undoubtedly the most challenging that the Doctor and River had ever experienced. Though the Doctor didn't have to be awake when River was, he insisted upon being the one to get the baby for her so she didn't have to get out of bed. The Tardis seemed to know what was going on and it provided meals for them whenever one or the other walked into the kitchen. As they flopped into bed after another long day, River yawned.

"I'm so tired, Doctor. If I can't get some sleep I don't know how I'll manage. If she's not awake, she's crying, and there's always one more thing to be done and I can barely keep my eyes open anymore."

"I never thought I'd be good at changing diapers," the Doctor told her. Since he couldn't really help with feeding Aliya, he insisted on changing her.

The Doctor rolled over to cuddle closer to his wife, but she moved away.

"It's not that I don't love you, sweetie," she said exhaustedly, "But I just don't want to be touched. I just want to sleep."

He propped himself up on his forearms and nodded, pressing a kiss to her forehead before he scooted back over to his side of the bed.

They slept for about two hours before Aliya's cries woke them. River sniffled a little, looking at her husband with red-rimmed, dark-circled eyes.

"I'm so tired," she whimpered. He rolled out of bed and padded to the nursery and checked Aliya's diaper. She needed a change, so he changed her and then carried her to River, who fed her. She sat up to burp her daughter, but the Doctor shook his head, scooping Aliya into his arms.

"Sleep love," he told her. "I can manage less sleep better because of the genes."

She was too tired to argue so she rolled onto her side and was asleep moments after her body relaxed. The Doctor walked with his daughter into the nursery and he closed the door. Walking around the room, he burped her and when she refused to sleep, making her little crying sounds, he rocked her back and forth, singing every lullaby he knew in Gallifreyan. It only took five or six lullabies for her to fall back asleep, and he was careful to lay her down on her back, rocking her cot for a while to insure she stayed asleep, swaddled in a faded blue blanket. He stood over the cot, gently rocking it from side to side as he studied her tiny face.

As the weeks passed, her hair had grown a little. It was dark brown, the color of his own, and it was already beginning to curl like River's. She had a tiny turned-up nose and a mouth so small and pink that he thought she looked a bit like a kitten. Her eyes were still River's blue but the shape of them was all Rory Williams. She was a perfect combination of him and her, of his family and the Pond-Williams family. She was beautiful.

He let the cot rock slower and slower until it stopped altogether. She didn't wake, which the Doctor attributed partially to the fact that the Tardis hum drifted quietly around the room. River had said that babies liked white noise, though he couldn't recall when she had said that. He assumed that this was an example of such a phenomena.

He quietly tiptoed out of the room and back into his bedroom, collapsing onto the bed. His eyes shut and he slept in the way of the exhausted or of a young child—deeply and dreamlessly.

The next morning, River was still exhausted. She was so tired that even the thought of getting up made her want to cry. The Doctor sat beside her as she ate the breakfast he'd fetched from the kitchen. She was propped up in bed, Aliya was asleep, and she wanted another nap.

"I think it's time we went to see your parents."

River nodded weakly,

"Mum can help with all this—she's done it before."

Once her breakfast was finished, the Doctor dialed the phone and called Amy Pond. He heard the click of the phone as she picked up.

"Hello?"

"Amy, it's the Doctor. When are you?"

"Melody just left for University a few weeks ago. It's just me and Rory."

"Well River's exhausted and you have a new grandchild. Her name is Aliya."

He could hear Amy scream with delight and call Rory over, though her hand over the mouthpiece muffled the sound slightly.

"We need help, Amy. River's so tired she can barely get out of bed and though we love Aliya, all she really does is sleep and cry."

"Babies do that," Amy told him. "When can we expect you?"

"Tomorrow."

"All right, we'll make up the guest room for you. Are you bringing a cot for her?"

"Yeah, we've got my old one."

"Great—I'll go out and pick up some groceries. You two need a home-cooked meal and Rory's been dying to try out this new recipe."

"All right, I'll see you tomorrow."

"Tomorrow then."

He typed in the coordinated and tossed the lever. The Tardis cheerfully materialized in the Ponds' back garden.

**Amy gets to see her grandchild, River will have some baby help, and Rory cooks! Keep a look out for the next chapter!**

**A/N: I'm sick this week and moving back to school into my apartment early next week, so you might have to wait for an update. Enjoy!**


	48. Little Family

Little Family

When the Tardis materialized in her back garden at approximately three in the afternoon, the day after the Doctor had called, no one was more surprised than Amy Pond. After having waited years for the Doctor, he being exactly on time was a concept so novel that she just stood staring at the Tardis for a few minutes, shocked. The Doctor shuffled out of his blue box and Amy bit her lip to keep herself from running over to hug him. He looked as though he could be knocked down by even the slightest push. His eyes were red-rimmed and dark-circled; he looked exhausted. Behind him, still in her robe, came River carrying a bundle.

If the Doctor looked like hell, River looked worse. Her skin was practically grey and her eyes were heavy-lidded. The bundle she carried seemed to hunch her over with its weight. Though they both looked like death, they smiled when Amy ran over, calling,

"Rory, they're here!" over her shoulder. Her husband appeared in the doorway and he walked over, calm and collected to Amy's fiery excitement.

"Mum," River said softly, "This is our daughter, Aliya Hope Song."

"Her Time Lord name is Novaerosalucieleyantesei," the Doctor added helpfully. Through the delicate pallor of their skin and their red-rimmed eyes, Amy could see the sparkles of joy, the awe at the little girl that they had created.

"She's wonderful," Amy said happily. "Can I hold her?"

River offered the baby out and Amy cradled her, examining her tiny face.

"Say hi to Grandma," the Doctor said softly, and Amy's head shot up.

"Grandma? No. Absolutely not. I'm not old enough to be a grandparent."

Rory seemed to take it better and he smiled down at his granddaughter.

"Hello Aliya," he murmured, smiling. The baby made a gurgling noise.

"Ooh, how'd you make her do that?" Amy asked, peering down at Aliya.

"Babies like me," Rory shrugged.

"What and not me?"

"You just said you weren't going to be her Grandma," Rory pointed out, and Amy looked from the cooing baby to her husband.

"What about Nana? Nana's all right, isn't it? Or Nan? Which one sounds least old?"

Rory shrugged, too keen on his grandchild to take notice of Amy's minor crisis; River smiled.

"Nan sounds nice and youthful, Mum."

"Really? Oh good," she sighed, relieved. Peering down at Aliya, she cooed.

"Your Nan loves you Aliya, yes she does."

Aliya gurgled and Amy beamed at River and the Doctor.

"See? She likes me just as much as Rory."

Rory rolled his eyes and looked the couple up and down.

"Why don't you come inside and have something to eat. It's getting chillier now so I made Irish pub stew."

"Dad, you're a saint," River mumbled, and she followed her parents into her childhood home.

The kitchen was warm and homey, with earthy-colored tiles on the floor and yellow walls. The curtains were white and let sunlight filter in as the yeasty smell of rising bread dough intermingled with the rich, meaty smell of the stew. River's mouth watered and her stomach rumbled.

"We'll feed you first, and then a nap," Rory said with the stern resolve of a father. "Supper will be served in about four hours."

"What about Aliya?" River asked. Amy smiled at her daughter.

"Are you breastfeeding or giving her formula?"

"Breastfeeding; we don't think that formula would give her all the right nutrients."

"Well do you pump bottles at all?"  
>River must have looked baffled because Amy elaborated.<p>

"You can get a pump for your breast milk so you can fill bottles with it. Then the Doctor can feed the baby sometimes and you don't have to constantly be up."

"We don't have one of those."

"All right, well we can fix that later. Eat something, feed the baby, and then we have a room made up for the pair of you. We'll wake you when it's suppertime."

The Time Lord and his wife ate rapidly and as River fed Aliya, the Doctor fetched a few things from the Tardis and found the guest room all set up for him and River. Once she was fed, River handed Aliya over to Amy whom began burping her expertly. She shooed her exhausted daughter upstairs.

"Nothing to worry about now, sweetheart; your father and I will look after the baby. Go get some sleep."

The bed smelled homey and nice. River had only just taken off her shoes and slipped under the covers when sleep overtook her. The Doctor lay beside her and for the next few hours, they had the soundest sleep that they had had in weeks.

River woke up feeling better. She was still tired and sore and ready to sleep some more, but her mother was smiling down at her as the Doctor gave a soft little groan from the other side of the bed.

"Dinner in half an hour, love. Why don't you have a shower while we finish everything up?"

River nodded and Amy pressed a kiss to her forehead.

"Aliya's an angel, Melody. Don't worry about her. Go wash up and we'll see you in a bit. All right?"

River nodded, relieved; she couldn't recall the last time that she could shower without the door open, listening for crying. Amy tiptoes out of the room and River looked over at the Doctor. He looked better, more like himself again. He hadn't even taken off his socks, and his hair was all over the place, his mouth slightly open. He looked peaceful. River didn't feel like sharing her shower, but she knew that he'd want one as well and she didn't feel like rushing through her shower either. Sighing, she laid a hand on her husband's cheek.

She whispered his Gallifreyan name and his eyes opened.

"Half an hour until dinner; do you want to shower?"

He nodded sleepily and she smiled involuntarily.

"Come on then."

"You're coming too?"

He sat up, lightning-fast, grinning from ear to ear.

"Doctor, we're just showering. Nothing else, all right? I'm tired and sore and I don't want to—well I'm just not ready yet, all right?"

He nodded, not managing to hide his disappointment very well. She smiled at him,

"I'm sorry."

He frowned at her,

"Don't apologize for this, River. It's not your duty to do this and unless you want to, you don't have to. All right?"

She nodded and he grinned at her and then tagged happily along as she made her way to the bathroom. Once the door was closed he stripped down to the skin without shame and she grinned, sneaking little glances over at him. Just because they weren't going to do anything didn't mean she couldn't enjoy the view. He turned on the hot water while she pulled off her clothes.

The water was as hot as she could stand and the heat soaked into her. Closing her eyes, she felt her shoulders relax, the tension in her back loosen and wash away. She washed her hair, happy to enjoy the feel of the suds and the smell of her shampoo. She rinsed her hair out while he began scrubbing shampoo into his dark hair; eyes squinted tight to keep the soap out. She washed her hair again, and then put in conditioner. It was a joy, a luxury, to shave her legs. It was usually somewhat of a chore, but after weeks of being too tired to bother, it felt like heaven to have her legs silky smooth and hair-free, to not feel the stubble on her underarms. The Doctor shaved his stubble as River scrubbed facial soap deep into her pores. They scrubbed each others' backs and took turns rinsing off in the steamy spray.

After toweling off and changing into fresh clothes, River and the Doctor descended to the ground floor, where the smells of baking bread and simmering stew filled their noses. As they slipped into the kitchen, River paused to take in the scene. Rory was carefully setting the crock-pot full of stew on the table and cutting thick slices of yeasty bread while Amy bounced baby Aliya, cooing to her.

"That smells amazing, Dad."

Rory smiled at his daughter,

"Thanks, Mels."

"Aliya was such a good girl," Amy told River, handing the baby back over. After getting some good sleep and a shower, she saw her baby as though with fresh eyes. She was tiny, beautiful, perfect. She was wonderful. Aliya burrowed her face into River's chest, mouth open a little.

"Do you mind if I feed her before dinner?"

"Go on ahead."

The Doctor sat with River as she fed Aliya, and then burped her so River could straighten her clothes up before they returned to the kitchen. Her nappy was clean so the Doctor carried her into the kitchen with them. Amy indicated a little buggy.

"Just pop her in there during dinner. She'll be all right."

After settling Aliya, they all sat down to dinner.

River was amazed by how good everything tasted. The Doctor was happily eating (without any weird additives for a change) and Rory kept glancing over at Amy and grinning. Amy grinned back.

"What is it?" River asked through a mouthful of bread.

"We've missed you," Amy confessed. "You went off to university and the house got all quiet. And now here you are, all grown up and with a baby, eating supper with us."

"It's nice to be home," River admitted. "I've needed the break."

"Well you're welcome to stay for a bit," Amy told her. "I'll teach you how to use the pump so you can get some milk bottled for Aliya. Then you and the Doctor can take shifts instead of this nonsense about being up together."

"It's not nonsense," River said, sounding a bit cross.

"You're both exhausted because you don't take turns getting up. One of you can have days and the other can have nights or something like that. If you're both up all the time, then both of you are equally exhausted."

"I think we're doing a good job," River replied defensively.

"River, we're both tired," the Doctor said softly in Gallifreyan. "Why don't we sleep on it, all right?"

She nodded slowly and looked apologetically at her mother.

"Sorry Mum, I'm just really tired. I'll think about it."

"That's my girl," Rory said quietly, a proud little smile on his face.

Amy encouraged River and the Doctor to tell them all about Aliya, so the couple told them of her birth, of the past few weeks. They told tales of first nappy-changes and working out breast-feeding. They told stories of the silly things they had said and done in their sleep-deprived state. The Pond-Williams' listened, smiling all the while. The Doctor told them about Jack's gift and the Tardis' helpfulness while River's eyelids began to flutter.

"All right, loves. You can tell us all about it tomorrow, all right? You're tired and it's time to get some sleep," Rory said firmly.

River nodded obediently and the Doctor scooped up Aliya, following his wife upstairs. After they had gone up, Rory turned to Amy.

"They remind me of us when we first had Mels."

Amy chuckled.

"Just as clueless, just as stubborn about trying to be good parents without any help at all."

"Well we know that they did a good job."

Amy smiled, recalling how River and her kids had come to visit the previous week.

"They all turn out all right in the end. They're good parents."

Rory smiled too.

"Well they had an excellent example."

**Dearest readers, I'm afraid that the story will soon be coming to a close. Two or three chapters more and then this story will be over. But fear not, I plan on having another story coming after I finish this one about the Doctor, River, and their kids. Don't know what it'll be called yet, but keep an eye out!**

**Thanks for all your love and support!**

**Gingerbritishgypsyelf**


	49. Parenthood

Parenthood

**Okay, as of "Let's Kill Hitler" this is all AU. I mean it was a BIT AU before but after all that stuff about River's childhood in the Hitler episode, keeping up any semblances of canon is pretty useless. Good thing we're in our last chapters or this would be a problem, eh? Anyhow, on with the story.**

Miraculously, Aliya only woke up twice to be fed, and between those two interruptions, River and the Doctor slept deeply. When she woke up, she was tired, but her body lacked the bone-aching exhaustion that had characterized her days up until just then. The Doctor was already awake, blinking at her with his enormous brown eyes heavy with sleep. Aliya wasn't crying so River laid back down and for the first time in weeks, pressed herself up against her husband's side, allowing him to curl an arm around her. This seemed to please him, as he buried his face in her hair and inhaled deeply. She chuckled sleepily and closed her eyes.

"Enjoying yourself?" she yawned.

"I missed you."

"I missed you too, sweetie."

She burrowed her face into his chest, relishing his heartbeats gently thumping in her ear and how good it felt to be wrapped in his arms.

"Want to go back to sleep?" he asked, and she had never loved him more in her entire life.

"You say the sexiest things," she mumbled sleepily and he laughed, closing his eyes and pulling the covers over their heads to block out the sunlight coming in from the window. They slept again.

River woke as soon as Aliya started crying, and she sat up, half-tumbling to the floor as she got up to get her baby. After a soft rapping knock, Amy walked in.

"Mum, you could have waited! What if we were naked?"

"One, I've seen it all before, and two, you barely have enough time to sleep. I don't think nudity is really a big issue right now."

"What if we were getting dressed?"

"You're not…why are you picking her up?"

"She's crying."

"Have you been doing that every time she cried?"

"Yes."

Amy shook her head.

"No wonder you're exhausted. Melody, you do not come every time that they start to whimper. A good bit of the time, they'll cry for a minute or two and then settle themselves back to sleep."

"She will?" River asked, looking at her baby with incredulity.

"Yes, and you're spoiling her by coming every time she makes a sound."

"But what if she really needs us?"

Amy smiled maternally at the pair of them.

"Doctor, when you talk, you're not always saying something important. We don't heed your every word because everything you say isn't important and vital to life. Same thing with a baby. Sometimes crying is just for attention or because they woke themselves up. If it's not important, they'll go back to sleep. If it is, then they'll cry louder and you'll come get them."

The Doctor nodded and River smiled a little half-smile as Aliya snuggled into her, making little baby noises, before settling back to sleep on her chest.

"See? Perfectly fine," Amy said. "Now come have breakfast. Rory's made French toast."

Normally, the Doctor would have launched into a story about some time before now that he'd eaten French toast and the subsequent adventures, but his eyes were bleary with sleep and he kept glancing affectionately over at his wife and daughter. It was as he watched his son-in-law shoot his daughter affectionate looks before looking adoringly at his baby granddaughter, that Rory Williams decided once and for all that he had made a good decision in allowing the Doctor to marry his daughter. The centurion, after all, had a soft heart and no matter how tough he would be on the Doctor, he knew that the Time Lord wouldn't ever have any problems with commitment.

They ate French toast and after breakfast, Rory bodily dragged the Doctor into the kitchen and coerced him into doing dishes. The Doctor complained minimally, mostly because he had reached a degree of sleep-deprivation-recovery where he was no longer on autopilot but was still too tired to argue much. Rory was intent on using this state to his advantage, and he gave the Time Lord yet another 'you'd better be good to her' lecture. Meanwhile, Amy and River had an awkward and mildly amusing lesson on how to use the breast pump so River could bottle some of her breast milk and not be forced to get up every few hours. They were just finishing when the Doctor walked in just in time to see River removing a strange device from her left breast. He paused for a moment and looked adorably indignant.

"What's going on in here?"

"It's the milk pump," Amy said calmly, taking the device so River could slide her ample breast back beneath her shirt.

"So it just sucks the milk out like a vacuum?"

"Something like that," Amy replied.

The Doctor eyed the device with suspicion.

"Does it hurt you?"

River shook her head.

"To be honest, it feels a little weird, but not really bad or good. It's just a means to an end."

The Doctor scowled at the milk-pump, scooped up his baby daughter, and shuffled sullenly out of the room. River made a face at her mother.

"What was that all about?"

Amy leaned to see if the Doctor was within earshot before she snorted with laughter.

"You didn't work it out?"

"Work what out?"

"He's _jealous_!" Amy giggled.

"He's what?"

"Jealous," Amy repeated with a devilish grin. "You have a milk pump that gets to touch you where he can't."

"No way," River protested, chuckling. "He's not that shallow…" she paused and then gently slapped her palm to her forehead. "Except he _is_ that ridiculous—that's exactly like him."

Amy laughed and River began laugh too, seeing the absurdity of the situation.

"But that's so ridiculous! It's not like I'm enjoying it or anything, it's just an easier way to feed Aliya!"

"Yes but how long has it been since he's been allowed to touch you?"

River blushed,

"_Mum_," she hissed, managing to sound like a mortified teenager.

"Well go on," Amy encouraged. "Think about it. Yes he's lovely and brilliant and clever and wonderful, but he's still a _man_."

"Oh I know," River murmured, an involuntary smile flickering onto her face. "Trust me, I know."

Amy rolled her eyes and the pair of them stood, Amy holding a bottle of still-warm milk. She screwed the top onto the bottle and smiled at her daughter, eyes sparkling with anticipation.

"Do you want to see something incredible?"

River cocked her head to one side, quizzical.

"What?"

Her mother handed her the bottle.

"Ask him to feed her."

As if on cue, Aliya began to cry. She wailed and though both women could hear the Doctor hushing her, singing Gallifreyan songs to her. After a bit, he came into the room, looking confused.

"I think she's hungry because her nappy is clean and she's not going to sleep."

"So feed her," River said casually.

"_River_," the Doctor said uncomfortably. "I haven't got…you know…"

"Breasts?" Amy interjected helpfully.

"Yes, those."

River handed him the bottle and he looked from it to his daughter with a mix of confusion and mild fear.

"I don't know what to do," he stammered, beginning to look terrified at the entire idea.

"Sit down," Amy coached and the Doctor did.

"Now prop her up a little in your arms so you can hold her in one arm."

Again he obeyed, managing to look both delighted and terrified as River gently teased the bottle into Aliya's open mouth. The baby latched onto the bottle and River guided his hand so that he was holding it. There, in the living room of the Pond-Williams house, the Doctor fed his daughter for the first time. River watched the fear on his face melt away and be replaced with a mixture of wonder and love. He looked at Aliya like she was the sun, moon, and stars. She watched him melt—he had been a father to Aliya before, and a good one at that, but this seemed to be a whole new level of adoration. River clicked her tongue, thinking to herself,

_Darling, you're going to be a Daddy's girl if I ever saw one._

His eyes were locked on Aliya's and his entire body seemed to hold itself differently. He wasn't tense, he wasn't relaxed, he was Aliya's father and he held himself so that she was the center of everything. River smiled as his expression softened at their baby's gurgling noises. He was _meant_ for this job, she thought to herself.

Once he had fed her, he expertly burped her and checked her nappy. Aliya blinked her huge eyes at him and he smiled, murmuring to her about how wonderful she was in Gallifreyan.

"Old softie," Amy muttered affectionately, and the Doctor didn't appear to hear her. River watched him walk from the room, explaining everything to his daughter.

Xoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxo

They stayed for the weekend, and after a hundred promises to return with the baby soon, they climbed back into the Tardis and flew off. The Doctor piloted, narrating the experience to Aliya in Gallifreyan.

"So she'll be learning Gallifreyan first then?" River asked, though it wasn't really a question.

"Of course; learning her culture is important."

River was hit with a sudden shock.

"What about the untempered schism?"

The Doctor paused, halting his piloting to glance protectively at his baby.

"I don't want her to see that."

"I had to," River told him. "The Silence showed it to me. Couldn't be a proper Time Lord without it I suppose."

"It changes everything," he murmured. "Everything you thought before seems different and strange and you either get inspired or go mad or run and nobody ever ends up _happy_, River. I don't want that for her."

"You also get shipped off to school right after that."

"I don't want that for her, River."

"I know, my love. But you also want her to be a Time Lord. And this is something we all had to do."

He sighed, shoulders drooping.

"I don't want her to ever get hurt."

"I know, sweetie. I don't either. There's still time yet. We've got eight years to work out how to handle this."

"You're right."

"Of course I am."

And that was settled. He parked them in Cardiff to charge up and the pair of them laid Aliya in her cot and went off to bed.

The Doctor lay awake for a long time, wondering about raising his daughter. He didn't know when the Library would come, if Aliya would see the untempered schism, how he would manage everything. In her sleep, River murmured something unintelligible and rolled over so she was stretched out against his body, her toes resting on his calves and her soft, curly hair tickling his chin. Taking a slow, deep breath, he sighed, releasing his worries for just a while, allowing himself to curl his arms around his wife and sleep.

**I'm thinking one or two chapters more now, my loves. Classes are taking a lot of my time, so you'll probably have to wait for the next chapter again. Sorry, but I hope I've made the wait worth it.**


	50. Parenting Without the Books

Parenting, Minus the Books

**Okay okay, I thought this was going to be the last chapter. And then I watched "The Wedding of River Song" and I HAD to make sure this wasn't the end. Two more, I think. This one and one other. It's going to be written in little scenes. Sorry for the delay; classes and all that. Well go on with reading this and SPOILERS for TWORS.**

"What do we do?"

"I don't know, this wasn't in the parenting book!"

"How could it not have been in the parenting book?"

"I don't know, it just wasn't!"

"You checked the Gallifreyan one AND the human one?"

"YES!"

"So what are we supposed to do?"

"…we could call your parents."

"No, absolutely not; I'd like to manage at least one baby-related problem without asking my mother for help."

"It can't be all that hard…we've saved worlds before, how hard can it be to give her a bath for the first time?"

River snorted and eyed the bathtub.

"When was the last time we cleaned that?"

The Doctor shrugged.

"When was the last time we used the bathtub for taking an actual bath?" River asked. "If we're in here, it generally ends in us sloshing water all over the place."

The Doctor had the grace to blush, and River nodded.

"This is exactly what I mean."

"What about the sink?"

"What about it?"

"We could give her a bath there…your parents said that it's a very human thing to do."

"Is the sink even clean?"

The Doctor coughed uncomfortably.

"I'll take that as a no."

"Usually the Tardis does it."

River felt the familiar brush of the Tardis in her mind.

"Come on…she wants us to go this way."

Cradling Aliya, she walked through the corridors as the Tardis shifted the rooms into a pathway for her. The Doctor tagged after, his bowtie slightly askew and a mildly worried expression gracing his features. Aliya gurgled quietly to herself and the Doctor chuckled.

"You don't even care, do you, darling girl?"

Aliya gurgled again, reaching out a chubby hand towards her father. The Doctor smiled.

"Mummy and I are going to be giving you your first bath, so you have to promise to be very good."

He and River spoke almost exclusively in Gallifreyan now. It was half to teach Aliya, and half because River wanted to be a little more fluent in the language. River threw a glance over her shoulder at her husband and smiled.

"Darling, she's your daughter. How likely is it that she'll behave?"

"Why can't we keep giving her sponge baths? She seems to like it."

"Grandma said that once the umbilical cord falls off, she's ready for her first bath. And it took longer than it would for a human baby, nearly a month. She's got to be cleaned sometime."

"She doesn't get all that dirty, she just lays there!"

"Doctor," River growled, "She's getting a bath."

The Tardis lead them to a sparkling clean bathroom with a wide, low tub. The air was very warm and River smiled as she saw there were towels stacked against one wall. She handed the baby to the Doctor and turned on the faucet, allowing warm water to fill the tub until it was two or three inches deep. She rolled up her sleeves, took Aliya back from the Doctor, and smiled at him.

"You're going to want to take off that jacket, love. It's going to get wet."

He slipped off his tweed jacket and unbuttoned the cuffs of his shirt, rolling up the sleeves as he watched River take off Aliya's tiny clothes and place her in the tub. Upon contact with the water, her expression changed from content to alarm. Screwing up her little face, she opened her mouth and let out a wail which rapidly turned into a screech.

River lifted her daughter from the tub and wrapped her in a towel as Aliya continued to wail.

"She doesn't like it," the Doctor remarked.

"No," River agreed.

The Doctor grinned and removed his shirt, then his shoes, socks, and trousers, so he was standing in his nebula-patterned boxers. He gently took Aliya from River's arms and cradled her, running a finger down the bridge of her nose.

"No need to fret, Aliya. Daddy's right here."

"What are you doing?" River asked.

"Well baths can be terrifying. I never liked them as a kid. So I figured if we were with her, she wouldn't mind as much."

River shook her head at her mad husband, smiling all the while. She pulled off her top and her trousers and stepped into the bathtub, sitting down. He climbed in as well and removed Aliya's towel, setting her in the water. She blinked at her father and lay quietly as he held her in his lap while River gently washed her soft hair and then her skin, carefully rinsing the soap so none of it got into her eyes.

"See? Not so bad at all, are they?" He asked his daughter. Aliya gurgled and clamped a tiny hand around his finger, blinking her enormous blue-green eyes up at him.

The first time Aliya as properly sick, River was as well. The baby had gotten ill first, but River had insisted on taking care of her and consequently caught whatever it was that Aliya had. They were both up all night coughing and the Doctor was wiping his daughter's nose about every two minutes and trying to bottle-feed her some of River's milk, which she consistently pushed away. River was no better, and though she drank the tea that he brought her in between running to fetch Aliya when she woke up crying again, neither of them had much interest in food.

He spent three days or so with no sleep, which he could do, but was unaccustomed to doing. Whenever Aliya fell asleep for a moment, River was awake and in a state of misery. When River was finally asleep, Aliya was awake again. When they were both asleep, he was removing stacks of tea mugs from their bedroom and constantly checking the nursery to make sure that Aliya was breathing regularly.

When his daughter began to show signed of improvement, it was a little easier. His routine became something along the lines of: _change Aliya's nappy, feed her, burp her, either put her down for a nap or lay her in her cot and put the mobiles on. Then go check on River. If she's awake, get her soup, tea, or a new box of tissues. If she does not need any of these things, refill the humidifier. Once River is looked after, go back to Aliya. If she's awake, play with her. If she's asleep, take the time to clear up any mess you've made in the past several hours of running around. _

By the time both girls were better, he was exhausted. On her first day out of bed, River went to take a shower. When she came out, feeling much better and ready to face the day, she found her husband completely unconscious on the couch in the library. On his chest, Aliya lay sound asleep. One of his arms was draped across her, keeping a hold on his baby daughter. River smiled, fetched the camera, and took a picture of the scene before going to get breakfast.

He attended the funeral out of respect. Astrid Peth had been a legend in her time, an adventurer and explorer, a role model to thousands of young girls. Her funeral, however, was surprisingly small. He wore a black suit and a blue bowtie, allowing River to smooth it for him before he left. He attended the ceremony alone, though River had asked if he wanted her to go with. It was funny, attending funerals. He knew that in a moment's time, he could see Astrid again if he wanted to. But it was important, attending her funeral. It was important because he had to remember that everyone dies and that though life is good, it is infinitely fragile. He could never allow himself to forget that.

When the funeral was over, he returned to the Tardis, his eyes a little damp and his black suit feeling too heavy for his liking. Pushing open the door, he was greeted by River, whom was holding Aliya. The baby appeared fascinated with the glittering silver watch on his lapel. After a moment, she looked up into his face. As her eyes met his, her face split into an enormous toothless grin.

"She smiled at me!" The Doctor gasped, looking up at his wife.

"She's never smiled before, unless you count when she had gas" River remarked, and she glanced down at her child, whom gurgled happily and flashed her father another enormous toothless smile. Smiling faintly, the Doctor lifted up his daughter and kissed her forehead before settling her into his arms.

"Hello Aliya," he cooed down at her. "Could you tell I was having a sad day?"

She merely gurgled and reached to grab at his bowtie. River smiled at him and walked over to the Tardis console.

"Where do you want to go?"

His eyes not leaving his daughter, he replied,

"Everywhere."

She took her first steps across the console room in pursuit of a rolling toy that the Doctor had set out for her. And when she fell and looked up to determine whether she ought to cry or not, he picked her up and twirled her around.

"Look at you, Aliya! You're walking!"

River laughed as he danced his daughter around the room, crowing about how brilliant she was. When he was done twirling her, he set her back on the floor, held one of her hands, and looked into her blue-green eyes.

"Come on, darling. We're going to walk to mummy."

And to River's delight, they did.

Her first word was 'allons-y,' much to the Doctor's delight and River's disapproval. He laughed for about ten minutes and encouraged her to say it as often as he could. Even when she was learning basic Gallifreyan, the sentence would often have the word tossed in. The most common one seemed to be,

"Mummy, Daddy, allons-y Tardis now?"

Even when her Gallifreyan and fluent and she was just learning English (with the psychic translators turned off, because that would be cheating,) she would often use allons-y. Eventually, River accepted it and smiled along with her daughter and her husband as the baby asked,

"Allons-y now, Mummy?"

As they lay in bed together, a two-year-old Aliya sound asleep in the nursery, the Doctor rolled over to face his wife.

"River, are you awake?"

She mumbled something and rolled over until her nose was lightly brushing his chest.

"Mmm-hmm," she responded groggily.

"I was thinking," he began quietly. "What do you think about having another baby?"

Her eyes shot open and she glared up at him.

"You want to run that by me again, pretty boy?"

He licked his lips.

"I know she's still a baby, she's two after all, but I was thinking that maybe…we could have another baby."

"After cleaning up after her today, after preventing a concussion and her nearly sonicking her head off, you want to have another baby?"

He nodded thoughtfully,

"Yeah…I think I would."

She switched tactics, pressing her body up against his and snuggling against him.

"You realize what that would mean, don't you?"

"What?"

"Me all hormonal, and then morning sickness and then all the aches and pains and then when we _did_ have another baby, do you remember how long you had to wait before you were allowed to touch me again? Do you still want another baby if it means all that?"

The Doctor winced a little, remembering the months he had watched longingly as River climbed into the shower without him and had pushed his hands away when they wandered anywhere remotely interesting. But he also remembered Aliya rolling over for the first time and when she teethed and how she took her first steps right in front of him. He remembered her babbling slowly turning into real words and how just today she had climbed into his lap and pointed to a giant book on Gallifrey and had beseeched in her high little voice,

"Home stories, Daddy? Home stories?"

He recalled how her face lit up when she discovered something new and how much she liked to do things by herself now, like put on clothes. He remembered how she had insisted on using the potty instead of her nappies and how she slept with her stuffed flubble from Jack. Thinking of all these things and the millions of others that she did that made his world so much better, he nuzzled the top of River's head with his nose.

"Yeah…I do."

**Okay I'm aware that this was really nothing plot-related at all and it was really just fluffy snapshots from Aliya's babyhood, but give me a break. I had to wrestle with Microsoft Excel for the past two days. And I hate that program with a passion. I'd really like to close this story off nicely so I think the next chapter will be the last. Don't expect it for a while—I have a life….okay no I don't. But I have school. Hope you liked it!**


	51. The Beginning

The Beginning

The Doctor kissed his sleeping wife's forehead before slipping out from under the covers and tiptoeing into the hall. Aliya's room was a few doors down and he peeked in, finding his four-year-old flipping through a Gallifreyan copy of Goodnight Moon. He smiled and she looked up, her mouth spreading across her face into a giant grin.

"Daddy!" she whisper-shouted and she leapt into his arms.

"Good morning," he chuckled and he kissed her dark curls. "We have to be quiet so we don't wake up Mummy, okay?"

"Okay," she whispered. "Can we go get Ian now?"

They stole out of Aliya's room and into the next one, where a two-year-old boy with bright ginger hair and even brighter blue eyes squealed happily from his crib.

"Daddy! 'Liya!"

Hushing his son, the Doctor balanced the little boy on his hip and escorted his daughter through the Tardis halls and into the kitchen.

"Where are we going today, Daddy?" Aliya had mastered the Gallifreyan language by age four and she spoke it exclusively unless they ran into strangers. Her English was good and she wasn't half bad at any of the other Earth languages. Little Ian, whose full English name was Ian Wilfred Song, was good at Gallifreyan and passable at English but hadn't moved up yet with any other languages.

"Allon-sy?" Ian asked eagerly.

"Breakfast first," he said brightly and both of his children looked around.

"Where's Mummy?"

"Why do we need Mummy? Can't we have breakfast with Daddy instead?"

"Daddy," Aliya said in the patient voice of a young child, "You can't cook."

"Sure I can!" He insisted enthusiastically. "You just watch me Aliya Song! Have a little faith!"

Ian looked from his father to his sister to the stove, and then threw back his head and wailed at the top of his lungs.

MUMMY!"

"Ian! Shhh! Mummy's sleeping!"

River shuffled into the kitchen, rubbing one eye sleepily.

"Not anymore. The Tardis woke me up. You threatened to try cooking, didn't you?"

"Daddy was gon' COOK, Mummy." Ian told her and then he laughed, blue eyes sparkling. River smiled and kissed his head.

"Good morning, sweet boy."

She moved to her daughter and planted a kiss on her head as well.

"Good morning sweet girl."

They made breakfast (they being River) and all ate. Ian made a minor mess with cereal and then proceeded to list the new words he had learned recently. River had dropped a pot on her foot the day before so three of the words were ones that the Doctor told Ian in a calm, relaxed voice were 'Mommy's mad words' and not to be used. After dropping the f-bomb twice more to test for effect, Ian gave it up and looked expectantly at his mother.

"Allon-sy Mummy?"

She threw her husband a glance,

"Of course, sweetheart. Mummy and Daddy will talk. Come on, let's go see the singers."

After settling the children with an interactive singing program, they cleaned the kitchen, all while discussing the potential adventure of the day. They decided on a group trip with the grandparents, though River agreed to pilot the Tardis. They tried to keep an approximate timeline with Amy and Rory, especially since they'd decided to have children as well. River's siblings played with their niece and nephew when they were all about the same age.

They flew to a far-off world and had an adventure that involved no shooting and more ice cream than was probably good for the four children and the Doctor. By the time the day was over, everyone was smiling and exhausted. Ian was starting to get fussy when River decided it was really time to get going.

After putting their children to bed, and River having a large glass of wine, they found themselves in their bed, just lying in each others' arms in that soft place between sleep and wakefulness.

"River?"

"Mmm?"

"I've been thinking."

She chuckled sleepily,

"You ate too much ice cream, dear."

"Oh the kids had fun."

"True, but you still had more sugar than you really needed to."

"What's your point?"

"Your thinking could be clearer."

"I was thinking that you were right."

She shifted so her head rested on his chest, her knee between his thighs.

"I'm listening."

"I love our kids, but I'm not always going to be able to be here. I think we need to get…a house. Not for all the time, mind. Just for when we need to go somewhere and we can't leave the kids in the Tardis."

She nodded, knowing how much it took for him to tie himself to something.

"Okay."

"It's gotta be cool though," he said quickly, trying to save face. "We've got to have the coolest house in the universe."

"You know…I think I can help you with that one."

"How?"

She got up pulled him with her. They went to the library where River dug through a pile of scrolls before pulling out a set of blueprints. She showed them to the Doctor, who grinned.

"That looks just cool enough."

"Good," River whispered. "Because I asked someone to build it for us three years ago."

The Doctor laughed delightedly.

"River Song, you're full of surprises."

"That's why you married me, isn't it?"

"That and because you're the best thing that ever happened to me."

She kissed him full on the mouth and slipped her hands into the waistband of his favorite nebula-patterned boxers, familiar with the dance they did. His arm slipped around her waist and pulled her closer, growling softly against her lips.

"Mummy?" came a soft voice, and River sighed quietly, pulling apart from her husband. They padded out of the library, down the hall, and into Aliya's room where she was clutching her stuffed flubble, teary-eyed.

"What is it Nova?" River asked, the Gallifreyan softening the words so they were gentler than the English translation.

"I had a scary dream."

River sat on one side of Aliya and the Doctor sat on the other as the four-year-old recounted a dream about a monster chasing her. The Doctor told her all about the monster, who happened to not only live on a planet they visited once, but was also a vegetarian whom was passionately fond of banjo music and tapioca pudding. By the end of the tale, Aliya was asleep again. River and the Doctor went back to their room, exhausted…but not too exhausted to finish what they'd started in the library.

The next day they visited the house which was built in a giant tree and decorated in soft colors, decorated with bright pictures and walls that you could draw on to your heart's content. There were ladders and nooks and a giant library full of books for all ages.

"How did you know I'd come around?" He asked her as Aliya and Ian clambered all over the bit of the tree that made part of their living room wall.

"I know you, sweetie."

"So it seems."

It was the beginning of their lives together, and yet the Doctor felt a deep sense of dread every once and a while, when his family slept and the Tardis was dark. He wondered, lying there awake, about the Library. He wondered about what was to come.

His relief came on Aliya's fifth birthday. He was grabbing a last-minute gift when he ran into a girl, maybe twenty-five, with chocolatey skin and a head full of thick curls. He literally crashed into her, knocking a box of red high heels open and tossing the shoes onto the sidewalk.

"Sorry, so sorry," he apologized, "I was just looking for a present for my daughter."

She looked up at him and grinned.

"Hello Dad."

He blinked once, twice.

"What?"

She held her red stilettos by the heels as she placed them back into the box.

"It's me, Daddy. It's Aliya."  
>"You've regenerated."<p>

"Yes, obviously. I like it though, especially the hair. It's nearly as great as Mum's. Now who's the present for?"

"You…you're turning five."

"Five…you got me a book and a magnifying glass."

"You're a Time Lord, Aliya."

"It was a really excellent book and the magnifying glass was more for you than me but we had fun with it."

"Any other clues?" He asked with a weak smile.

"Dad…you know the spoilers rule."

"Of course, silly me."

"But I'll give you a hint."

He leaned in closer in time to hear her say,

"Do you know what I love about libraries, Dad? No matter what you check into the system, you can always check it back out."

She was gone before he could ask any more questions, but he located Aliya's gift and that night he slept sounder than he had in years.

THE BEGINNING

**This is the end of this fic but the beginning of a story of a family. I don't intend on doing any collabs or extenders on this, though I may grace you with little oneshots from the future of the Song family now and again. And if you're very very good, I might write about how they save River. I've appreciated your comments, questions, and dedicated support to this fic and to me as an author and I hope to hear more remarks from you in the future. But until then, dear readers, Merry Christmas. And I hope you all have a very happy New Year.**

_** THE END.**_


End file.
